The Trashing of Truth

by Erven E. Park

Lying — The Heartbeat Of Lawlessness

"Evil has many doors and lying is the one key that fits them all."

You can no more expect the "rule of law" to function without a core precept centering on truth than you could expect your human body to function without a heart. The two are inseparable. Those who treat casually the truth governing a society formed around the "rule of law" are inviting a lawlessness (anarchy), which will inevitably follow. Law and order cannot coexist with condoned falsehood.

Lying is a particularly vicious and destructive fault. There is no doubting that in times of weakness or imprudence most all of us have employed a lie on occasion. But it is only the depraved or demented that would not come to realize its insidious properties. Indeed, lying is one evil equally condemned by not only God, beginning with the Eighth Commandment,¹ but by all secular cultures that wisely give preeminence to the "common good" and "right reason," based on the natural law in their governing policies.

Any nation or culture that comes to granting license to lying has initiated its own death warrant. Yet, that very process is well on the way in our nation today. Don't look around for some thing or some one to point to. It is we who have allowed this to come about and it is only we, the citizenry, that can remove the lying rabble we've allowed to infest our governing offices and that have turned on us, our families and our nation.

In our times, lying in the public arena has become so commonplace that numerous have become inured to its extremely deadly properties. Moreover, one's indifference to lying as an "everybody does it" syndrome is an assurance that they themselves have become worthless citizens.

Do you take these comments as being possibly exaggerated in concept? What would be your reaction to being informed that a State Supreme Court had overturned laws that protected the citizenry from false testimonial and claims (under penalty of heavy fines) and ruled that politicians cannot be held punitively accountable for false statements (lies) employed by them in their own campaign material? Bizarre?

This is precisely what occurred in June, 1998 in a ruling put forth by the Washington State Supreme Court in a document entitled: "STATE OF WASHINGTON ex rel. Public Disclosure Commission" (http://lw.bna.com/lw/19980630/64332.htm) In this lengthy document (32,000 + words — 53 Pages) you will find such Orwellian argumentation as the following:

"Therefore, the Supreme Court has recognized that to sustain our constitutional commitment to uninhibited political discourse, the State may not prevent others from "resort{ing} to exaggeration, to vilification of men who have been, or are, prominent in church and state and even to false statement." Id. (emphasis added). At times such speech seems unpalatable, but the value of free debate overcomes the danger of misuse. McIntyre, 514 U.S. at 357. For even false statements make valuable contributions to debate by bringing about "the clearer and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error."

This judicial travesty was adopted in a 5-4 decision by the 9-judge panel. One of the dissenting judges factually saw it for what it was and wrote: "the first court in the history of the Republic to declare First Amendment protection for calculated lies."

Lawmakers Conditioning the Public to Premeditated Lying

In 1998-1999, the whole nation was laid awash in the sordid spectacle of the impeachment proceedings of then President Clinton. The House of Representatives voted for impeachment, but the Senate (in a narrow decision) voted against it. In the considerable verbiage that was contrived and emitted from the supporters of Clinton and their ilk was the assertions repeated again and again that even though Clinton was exposed as guilty of engaging in adulterous sodomy consummated in the offices of the white House, these acts of debauchery did not constitute grounds sufficient to disqualify the President from office. That grand plan of subterfuge will have to go down as one of the most successful con-games ever put over on the peoples of a whole nation.

What was concealed was the FACT that Clinton was NOT impeached for his immoral acts in office. He was impeached specifically and solely for his criminal act of publicly lying under oath — for criminal perjury! Indeed, adulterous sodomy is a much lesser crime than lying under oath. Lying under oath is, and should be, an impeachable offense. Moreover, if one in public trust lies about a lesser offense, how much more is he apt to lie about greater ones? Such a person dare not be seen as acceptable to the high offices of public trust, let along that of the highest office of the land. That's a no-brainer!

What then is the message we are being told to swallow? It cannot be other than the following: All of those in Congress, whether Democrat or Republican, who voted against the impeaching of Clinton really testified to the fact "for a President (and therefore any public official) to purposely lie under oath is no big deal. Such an unlawful criminal act does not disqualify him for office." May I suggest that the common good and right reason would look upon such comportment of a public official as treachery. It should be understood, in no uncertain terms that those Congressman who cast their votes for acquittal, by that act showed themselves as being unfit for office. They demeaned the office of the President immeasurably and made a mockery of the "rule of law".

Some Background to Our Days

Although lying is a fault that all of society has occasion to confront, it is noted to be particularly focused in our day with the practitioners of the ideology which is now popularly referred to as "liberalism." In fact, the ideologies of liberalism, socialism, Marxism, and communism are all wedded, and proceed from the same brood house. It should be pointed out that "liberal" is a term adopted by the socialists themselves in seeking to disassociate from the stigma that had become attached to that ideology. I need not here reiterate what recent history has revealed pertaining to the lethal properties of these particular "...ism's". "Evil empire(s)" is one apt description of their outcomes when allowed to assume power.

Lying is an acknowledged tool of socialism/Marxism as not only taught by Marx but as incorporated in certain Marxist constitutions. Vladimir Lenin, a devoted follower of Marx and a father of the societal and world-wide disaster that came to be known as Communism, had the following words to say of their governmental intentions: "The lie is sacred, and deception will be our principal weapon."

Liberalism has its postulants wherever right reason is discarded, with the Democratic Party in the U.S. now demonstrating to being one of its strongholds.² That was not so 40 years ago. Furthermore, having premeditated deception as an adopted commandment, its adherents are ruthless adversaries with literally no constraints applied to the disseminating of falsehood. One will ask: "Why would they consider lying necessary to their advancement?"

Liberalism, quite frankly, will not stand up to the scrutiny of reasoning and logic. The object of proper reasoning, of course, is truth. The dissection of socialism in its many faces reveals that it is not a champion of the person but rather an exploiter of factions and resources to the detriment of persons. When its bones are exposed, it shows to being totalitarianism in its final result. Nazism was factually a form of socialism! Those facts, however, are not going to "play in Peoria" and so enters: evasion = obfuscation = misrepresentations = LYING! Once embraced, lying goes on to entrap. "This falsehood of the tongue leads to that of the heart, and in time depraves all its good dispositions." ³

Liberalism seeks and attains its power through the development of a constituency lured or attracted to dependence. A mirror, if you will, of the "bread and circus" provided to the unruly masses of the old Roman Empire. Reality discloses that dependence does not germinate from the productive but wealth does. To the socialist, that wealth is absolutely necessary to provide the "bread and circus" for their developing debtor multitude. It does not take a rocket scientist to compute the economics from there. The producers must be made to provide for those who do not and the liberalist demands the empowerment to assure that he shall be its administrator. The liberalist thus sets themselves up as the power broker between these two contrived enmities, which they spawn and nurture.

The whole sordid history of socialist philosophy has been none other than an unbroken path of human suffering and disaster. Why then the attraction? Maybe that would best be answered by asking the question: "How many would be attracted to that which promised to provide from another's coffers?" The temptation to the weak or slothful is undoubtedly considerable and the attraction to the unscrupulous seeking power has demonstrated to be irrepressible.

There is also a superficial emotion that liberalism attracts to itself. There is a contemporary saying that describes this well. "Show me a young person who is not a liberal and I will show you he who is heartless. Show me a mature person who is a liberal and I will show you he who is brainless!"

The young idealist who looks to being challenged in bettering the world rushes to the battlements where the bugles are sounding a call to save the so-called downtrodden. It takes the discomfort of discovering their Robin Hood leaders as being real hoods to awaken them. As Abraham Lincoln declared, however, "You can fool some of the people all of the time..."

We in the U.S., however, have endured the best efforts of the liberalists over the years without seriously succumbing to their perennial mendacities. What, then, is accounting for their very real upsurge of influence and conviction in our day?

There has come about a particular phenomenon on the American scene, which I do not pretend to have an answer for, but which does account for the liberalists' ascent of recent decades. A force that has been "tipping the scales," so to speak. That dynamism is the big news media (print and electronic), which has departed from its historical (legitimate) function of reporting to that of advocacy. From that of "calling a spade a spade," to that of openly advancing a liberalist culture. In times past the news media, for the most part, functioned well as a watchdog on abuses in government. Immoral and bad acts or activity were quickly brought to the attention of the citizenry, and as a consequence the unprincipled were held considerably restrained. The media then, in the mold of the great and memorable Will Rogers, were the champions of the populace who, of course, were their purpose in being.

The 50's found our institutions of higher learning being literally glutted with tenured faculty who were liberalists to the core. Their yield of young leftist ideologues into society was extraordinary and its effect was bound to come to fruition. This surfaced in the form of the considerable societal disruption of the 1960's. The moral degradation and debauchery publicly exhibited by such events as "Woodstock." The civil disobedience associated with Viet Nam and Kent State. The "don't trust anyone over thirty" gaggle, and so on.

Rebellion was the creed of the young intellectuals. As was pointed out earlier that which most effectively awakens misled activists is the painful teacher best known as "reality." Those with the vital and essential responsibilities of raising families or running their own businesses, get into reality (maturity) very swiftly. The preeminent worth of the individual, as differentiated from special interest groups or causes (liberalism), comes to the forefront quite emphatically! So what we find ourselves with, then, in our contemporary liberalist cadres are essentially the immature and the ideologues so obsessed with control and power as to have despoiled their standards to that of a brown-shirt thuggery! For those who would assert that this description (thuggery) is heavy handed, I would inform them that lying is violence by stealth and any who employ it in matters of public morals and governance are a deadly citizenry.

I do not claim the competency to analyze all the forces that have come into play and which have produced such a converging of liberalists in the cores of the communications industry. On the other hand, it is well known that militant activists are attracted to media, which gives them a platform for their burning adolescence, or ideology as in the instance of zealots. In any event, one can be assured that the environment of the liberalist media is not going to produce the reality check that the real world imposes.

Coming from the cornerstone of sound reason and logic, this marriage of the media to liberalism would appear an exercise in self-destruction. If there was any industry that has access to the worldwide statistics which lay bare the abominations of socialism, it is the news media. Empirical data in the hands of these organizations (or freely available to them) proves without exception that socialism has been a disaster to the peoples and economies of all nations succumbing to its embrace. Moreover, the facts show the first sector that shall be confiscated and subjected is that of the public media in all its forms. (Buying the rope by which to hang themselves?) Such, however, is all-typical of the foresight of the ideologically blind.

As has been demonstrated, lying is part and parcel of the operating mechanics of liberalism in our day. That media personages and organizations would embrace such behavior is particularly arrogant and audacious. Theoretically the "Achilles heel" of the news media is its credibility. Without credibility their worth diminishes drastically in the market place. Yet we see their consolidated efforts at not only reporting falsehood but also manufacturing it, all to the service of liberalist ideology. The only reasoning that would support such insolence must be their convictions that they have such control of the dissemination of information that the greater populace will not become aware of their collective chicanery. They have been "leading with their chin," however, for as this counterfeit front continues to become breached (as the New York Times and CBS News are learning), their devastation is going to be quite thorough.

This may in fact be coming to critical mass at this very time with the spectacle now playing of the assemblage of major media displayed as braying asses bellowing their absurdities. This holds true also of all politicians and their bureaucracies, regardless of their party affiliation. These assaults on sanity and the common good, however, are performing the public service of revealing the true corruption of character that so infests the general media of our day.

Until recent times, the monopoly and control of information disseminated to the public by the major media has been a formidable force. Those recognizing the assault on truth being promulgated by these forces found an impenetrable wall in attempting any rebuttal to this injustice. With such power it is not difficult to conceive the "public be damned" demeanor that has dominated media comportment of the recent past. That milieu is now changing, however, and at a pace that has the powers of the liberal media looking on in horror.

The dual phenomena which has come on the scene and which is evermore perforating the walls of the aberrant media is that of conservative "talk radio" and what has come to be known as the "Internet." Liberalism can get no traction on talk radio because experience is showing them no one will listen to it, and millions of persons are now able to impart and acquire information (facts) on a massive scale via the Internet. The media are finding they cannot money or muscle their way over these mediums and their consequent rage is truly a joy to behold. So much for the "best laid plans of media and men."

Let me close with a repeat from the mouth of Vladimir Ilich Lenin, a real life Twentieth Century destroyer of nations: "The lie is sacred, and deception will be our principal weapon." There is a secondary message in this statement that is every bit as revealing as the first. That is: by proclaiming the "lie is sacred," it assures that these words come straight from the "Father of Lies," Satan himself. Lying sanctioned has Gulags, genocide, death and destruction written all over it, and it will be our fate if we permit it. We have it confronting us right now and if we allow it to continue on its course, we are worthless citizens indeed!

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NOTES: 1 Proverbs 6: 16-19 -- Six things there are, which the Lord hateth, and the seventh his soul detesteth: Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, A heart that deviseth wicked plots, feet that are swift to run into mischief, A deceitful witness that uttereth lies, and him that soweth discord among brethren. DRV 2 No political party is entirely free of the socialist/liberal element. It would be ludicrous for example to believe that all the many hundreds of democrats who have become Independent or Republican over past years have been converted from their socialist ideologies. 3 Thomas Jefferson