A few months ago, when confronted about running an ad that depicted
Obama discussing the economy when the president was actually quoting
John McCain, Mitt Romney said,
“What’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.” I have previously
suggested that the ability to disconnect words from authorship made
changing positions even easier for Romney.
But this pattern of lying and not acknowledging it even when
confronted directly has persisted and has led me to look for other
sources of Romney’s behavior, and of his clear comfort with continuing
it. I think much of this comfort stems from his Mormon faith.
First, let’s look at a recent example. Last month, Romney held up a book called The Escape Artists written by Noam Scheiber of The New Republic. He said
that the book showed that the Obama administration knew that Obamacare
would slow down economic recovery and didn’t particularly care.
Scheiber wrote
on May 21, 2012, that Romney had the wrong “take-away” from the book.
He quoted Romney as having said, “In this book they point out that they
said the American people will forget how long this recovery took. So
that means that when they went into this knowing that when they passed
Obamacare, it was going to make life harder for the American people.”
This is not at all what Scheiber wrote, though he did write that the
Obama administration could have done more to help create jobs by pushing
for a bigger stimulus package. He never said that Obama knew that he
was sacrificing the economy to pursue his pet project.
What is not dramatic is that Romney never recanted his position after
Scheiber detailed what the book actually said three days later. But
what is dramatic is what happened two weeks later, on June 6, when
Romney said the same thing again — albeit it with slight differences. Romney said
that the Obama administration “knowingly slowed down our recovery in
order to put in place Obamacare, which they wanted and they considered
historic but the American people did not want or consider historic.”
So on June 7, Mr. Scheiber again
had to repeat the actual words from his book. Rachel Maddow, on her
MSNBC program, asked aloud why Romney continues to lie in the face of
evidence to the contrary. She said that in the case of Solyndra, when
Romney lied explicitly about where the money went, he was “nailed for
telling that lie” about Solyndra steering money to the Obama
administration’s friends and family. The Chicago Tribune had
the headline “Romney Hits the Sauce Again” — implying that you can be a
teetotaler and still behave with the certainty of a drunk.
I found myself discussing this situation with several colleagues and
we agreed that Romney doesn’t lie. Let me repeat: Mitt Romney doesn’t
lie. He is telling the truth as he sees it — and truth it is, facts
notwithstanding. This is not simply a case of Hamlet arguing about point
of view, saying, “for there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking
makes it so.” This is about a conflict between evidence and faith.
There is a long tradition in the Mormon belief system where evidence
takes second place to faith. Examples abound, as when two Mormon Elders
who were questioned about the inconsistency in passages from the Book of
Mormon said “We know the Book of Mormon is true and that it contains
the Word of God even in the face of evidence that appears
contradictory,” according to The Mormon Missionaries
by former Mormon Janice Hutchison. Thus there are no lies, only
faith-based certainty that translates as truth for which no apology is
needed, since what was said was not a lie.
Children learn to lie at different times in their development, but
almost always by the age of 10. Their lies help establish them as
separate from their parents, especially if the parents believe them. And
one doesn’t have to be a Mormon to lie — just look at John Edwards or
former Nevada Senator John Ensign. But in the Mormon Church, there was a
decision to accept authority as true — whether or not evidence
supported it. Hence Joseph Smith, the founder of the faith in 1820,
claimed he was illiterate and received the “Book” directly from God. But
he could read, and read very well.
This unwavering faith is central to Romney’s comfort deflecting any
examples that the press might bring up of his lying. Further it allows
him to repeat lies again and again — both personally and in political
advertising — because to him they are not lies at all. I’m reminded of
that old epigram from the 1960s that said “My mind is made up; don’t
confuse me with the facts.” That may be all good and well in many
offices, but it’s not so good in the Oval Office.
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