LYING IS NO BIG DEAL ANYMORE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000201200002-8
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 19, 2012
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: January 21, 1987
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/19: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201200002-8
Richard Cohen
WASHINGTON POST
21 January.1987
Lying Is No Big Deal Anymore
- - - - it
In May 1960, the Soviets downed a In present-day Washington panted McFarlane to Tehran on the
U.S. spy plane over Central Russia. same per, seems almost quaint to lament how
Thinking the pilot, Francis Gary Pow- As for the president, he too has frequently lies are told. But honesty is
ers, was dead. President Dwight D. played cute with the truth. Asked a virtue for its own sake, and lying is a
Eisenhower authorized NASA to say repeatedly at a press conference symptom that something is awfully
that one of its civilian planes was whether a third country-Israel- wrong. Very often, the lies stem from
missing. Only after the Soviets later was involved in shipping arms to Iran, one big lie such as the president's
announced that Powers was a captive he always said no. Since we now know insistence that he would not bargain
and had confessed to piloting a spy the president himself authorized the for hostages. In these cases, the sub-
plane did Ike 'fees up. Yes, the U-2 shipments; we can rule out the pozsi- Sequent ties are really efforts to maia-
was a spy plane, he confessed. The bility that he was ignorant of the taro or implement policies that lack
government had lied. facts. With his Bible in Iran. the public approval and not, as is often
The incident is worth recalling be- president presumably felt free to say claimed, to ensure national security.
cause the revelation that the gov- whatever was convenient. It is not just the lies that are insup-
ernment had lied was as much a shock More and more, government offi- portable; it is the policy itself.
as the news of the spy flights them- cials seem to have adopted the law- That is the nub of the Iran affair.
selves. It was "the first time many yer's cutesy distinction between lying doing something
said he president nt wdas n dnot--doing: it se-
se-
[Americans] learned their leaders did and perjury. The former is permitted, The
not always tell the truth," wrote Mi- indeed sometimes required, while the cretly because he knew Americans
chael R. Beschloss in his history of latter, of course, runs the risk of were opposed. From that eic de-
the incident. Up to then, a be uttered prison. Thus, it is all right to lie to the cep eon sFrom the oat ep They
by a public official was considered a people through the press, but not differ stemmed
purpose d and consequence
grave matter. under oath to Congress. from the lie Ike told about the U-2
No more. Now some public officials Of course, there are times when a from about the U-2
seem to think that lying is just part of government official has to lie. Former affair. He was cheating o d chofficial-
their job. An example is Robert C. national security adviser John Poin- sians. Re e Reagan
cheating on administrations McFarlane, the president's former are Hying, on the eve of the Grenada us.
national security adviser. Through invasion, that such an operation was
persons who speak for him, he admits under way. It's hard to know what
that he helped concoct a false chro- else he could have done. And as for
nology of the Iran arms sale to make Eisenhower, his deception was aimed
it seem President Reagan was un- at the Russians, who were about to
aware of the first shipment. Later, meet with him in Geneva. He was
having raised his right hand to take an trying to protect that summit meet-
oath before a congressional commit- ing.
tee, he told the truth: the president But there Is a casualness to some
had indeed authorized the first ship- recent lying that takes your breath
meat. away. Where once a He was an ex-
Around the time the Iran story was traordinary event and excused only
breaking, McFarlane denied at least for the highest reasons of state, lies
twice on television that he had taken are now sometimes uttered for sheer
with him on a trip to has a Bible convenience's sake, often to avoid
inscribed by the presidents, sad a cake embarrassment. McFarlane's state-
baked in the shape of a trey. As I ments and actions fall into that cate-
recall, he looked his int4rviewers in gory. Often they are excused under
the rubric of "protecting the presiden-
t" eye and said, *Yee know me cy," a verbose, highfalutin phrase that
better than that.' Well. we do do sow. usually comes down to protecting a
We are reliably inforttrsd` that both particular president from the wrath of
reports are essentially true. There his own people. By his own admission,
was a Bible; there was a cake, al- McFarlane was engaged in a cov-
though they may have been brought er-up.
by Lt. Col. Oliver North, who accom-
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/19: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201200002-8