The lies of children and politicians

I went with my father to Hawaii last week. It was a trip down memory lane. My father has fond memories of being stationed at Hickam Air Force Base. I have fond memories of my father.

My father has always taken great pride in his flowers and his yard. I was little when we lived at Hickam. My father would come home and find his flowers had been dug up. I would have the Hawaiian red dirt on me and one of the kitchen spoons would most likely be found in the flower bed.

When Dad would ask me if I had been digging in his flower bed, I would assure him that it wasn’t me. There is a great deal of research done on young children and lying. Children, as young as three years old, can make a deliberate decision to lie in order to hide their misdeeds.

My father had recently bought a movie camera and when he saw me digging in the flower bed, he got the camera and slipped around the edge of the house to film me. When the film came back from being processed, the whole family was sitting in the living room watching the film.

The moment I saw the footage of myself digging in the flower bed, I immediately said “Daddy, look at that other little Debbie digging in your flower bed.” Even with clear evidence that I was the guilty party, I denied that I had been digging in the flower bed.

While the first lies that children learn to tell are to conceal misdeeds, the second lies they learn to tell are the ones make false claims in order to make themselves look good.

What does this have to do with politics? Children grow up!

The democrats have recently accused the Chamber of Commerce (which is supporting Republican candidates) of using contributions from foreign contributors to fund the Anti-democratic. Looking into the matter, New York Times reporter Eric Lichtblau said: "A closer examination shows that there is little evidence that what the chamber does in collecting overseas dues is improper or even unusual, according to both liberal and conservative election-law lawyers and campaign finance documents.”

When President Obama’s senior advisor, David Axelrod, was asked by CBS’ Bob Schieffer if he had any evidence that the chamber was using secret foreign funds to influence the election, Axelrod responded ''Well, do you have any evidence that it's not, Bob?'' Mr. Axelrod said. ''The fact is that the chamber has asserted that, but they won't release any information about where their campaign money is coming from. And that's at the core of the problem here.''

The skills learned by children to tell lies in order to hide misdeeds and of making false claims to look good has been taken to the political level. Mr. Axelrod has just made the Chamber of Commerce appear criminal without any evidence. His argument is simply that there isn’t any evidence that they aren’t doing something wrong.

Save me from this type of politics.