Mark Twain once said that "a lie has more lives than a cat." Maybe he said it, but he likely wrote it down, too. There's an old newspaper saying, "Don't say it, write it." But that's off the topic. Twain was opining on the topic of honesty. He had figured out that it takes a lot of effort to keep track of the lies that you have to say in order to cover up the first lie that you uttered, and to whom you have uttered it. When I am honest, I'm only honest by default -- I'm not smart enough to keep inventing alibis and subterfuge. Too complicated. I'd like to lead a life of rigorous honesty but there are conditions. I'd rather not do harm just for the principle of it. So is that being rigorously honest? I suppose not. Honesty should be regulated like handguns.
Some people have no trouble at all inventing all sorts of things, and have no problem with the deceptions. It's called criminal instinct -- what Bob Dylan referred to when he sang, "To live outside the law, you must be honest." People are fond of claiming that there are immediate or not so immediate consequences as a result of one's perfidy. "Perfidy." That's a great word. W.C. Fields used it when he was arguing with his wife. In that wonderful classic movie, What's New, Pussycat," Peter Sellers is having shouting match with his jealous wife, who wears a helmet with horns.
"You are a lascivious adulterer!" she yells at Sellers aka Dr. "Baby Fritz" Fassbender, a crazed Viennese psychiatrist.
Fassbender is furious. "Stop calling me a lascivious adulterer until I look up what it means."
It's still fashionable to dismiss an injury done to you with "What goes around, comes around." That suggests there is some universal, cosmic code of justice. Instant karma. Don't count on it.
On the topic of law and honesty, I was riveted by a story in the paper the other day. A fellow named Andrew Bamberg got a ticket for running a stop sign in Redwood City. He could have paid the $215 fine, and that would have been it. Yes, the fine was a little steep but he's now facing four years in prison. He went to a lot of trouble to fabricate false evidence in hopes of getting off. He even replaced street signs and took pictures of another intersection. And, of course, this involved lying to the authorities. Lots of lying. To tell lies in court means the lie goes to another level. It's called perjury. Mr. Bamberg was convicted of three felonies. More lives than a cat. The lies escalated and escalated. Yikes.
It's been said that a big lie is easier to get away with. For example, Hitler's people set fire to the Reichstag, the center of German government, and spread the word that the arson had been the work of the communists when, in truth, it was started by the Nazis so they could swing public opinion their way -- and that's when the big trouble began. They finally got their comeuppance but they took their country down with them -- and a whole lot of other people, too.
Billy Wilder said, "Never steal anything small." But he was kidding. Maybe.
All the same, when Daniel Ellsberg leaked the Pentagon Papers, we discovered the Gulf of Tonkin incident, Lyndon Johnson's justification for the Vietnam War, was all made up. The administration was determined to go to war. A young man, who's working at the It's A Grind coffeehouse on Polk for the summer, asked, "Doesn't anybody read any history?" It takes time for the truth to emerge. As for those elusive Weapons of Mass Destruction, President Bush takes the issue head-on: "We're beyond all that now." End of story. It's the foreign policy of The Sopranos: "Fahgedaboutit!"
Maybe that's why Michael English, the charming Irish barman at Perry's on Union, refers to the political dynasty as "the Bush crime family." I laugh every time he says it. Mr. English is a fresh breeze of bluster, a good antidote to Fox News. Is lying to protect the people you work for, as Scooter Libby did, an admirable thing? I don't know but I m sure someone is going to take care of Scooter's cat while he's away.
Yes, cats have at least nine lives -- not quite as many as a lie -- but what's really refreshing about animals is how they do not have the capacity to be dishonest.
Bruce Bellingham is the author of Bellingham by the Bay. He's supposed to be working on something called The Angina Dialogues, if he ever gets to the heart of the matter.
