What’s the matter, Mr. President? That “checks and balances” thing not working out for ya, pal? Obama and Speaker of the House John Boehner met Friday to work out a deal that would raise the federal government’s debt ceiling. The meeting ended abruptly with no deal being cut. Who’s to blame depends on whose version of events you believe.
According to the Web site christianpost.com, this is the president’s take: “I think that one of the questions that the Republican Party is going to have to ask itself is can they say yes to anything? Can they say yes to anything?
“We’ve now put forth a package that would significantly cut deficits and debt. It would be the biggest debt-reduction package that we’ve seen in a very long time. And it’s accomplished without raising individual tax rates.
“It’s accomplished in a way that’s compatible with the ‘no tax’ pledge that a whole bunch of these folks signed on to, because they were mindful that they had boxed themselves in and we tried to find a way for them to generate revenues in a way that did not put them in a bad spot. And so the question is, ‘What can you say yes to?’ ”
Obama said that Boehner walked away from their golf outing. Here’s Boehner’s take, and, not surprisingly, it’s quite a bit different. According to the Christian Post website, “Boehner said it was Obama who walked away after Boehner balked at a last-minute demand for revenue.”
Quoting Boehner directly, the story continued:
“The White House moved the goal post. There was an agreement on some additional revenues, until yesterday when the president demanded $400 million more, which was going to be nothing more than a tax increase on the American people.
“There was an agreement with the White House at $800 billion in revenue. It’s the president who walked away from his agreement and demanded more money at the last minute.”
Clearly, one of these gentlemen has an adversarial relationship with the truth. Either that, or we’re seeing a classic case of what has been called the “Rashomon syndrome” in the Obama-Boehner tiff.
(Rashomon is Japanese director’s Akira Kurosawa’s classic tale of several people recounting the same incident, with each giving stories that, at times, directly contradict one another.)
Which of these men people choose to believe will depend on their ideology or political party. But here’s what we know: Elected officials, Democrats and Republicans, have been known to lie.
There’s a significant difference in how members of each party react to their respective prevaricators. Republicans who lie and get caught in their lies don’t become more popular with other Republicans. Classic case: President Nixon after the Watergate affair in the early 1970s.
Democrats who lie and get caught in their lies become more popular with other Democrats. The more lying Democrats lie, and the bigger the size of their stretchers, the more popular they become in their party.
Classic case: President Clinton lying his tush off about the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Even more classic but not as well known: Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley during his first term.
Shortly after O’Malley took office in 2007, one of his harshest critics was fired from his radio show on Morgan State University’s radio station. Suspecting O’Malley had a hand in the sacking, reporters questioned him about it. O’Malley denied even knowing the guy.
It turned out O’Malley did know him, and proof of it came to light. The result: O’Malley became even more popular with Maryland Democrats, winning a landslide re-election in 2010.
Is Obama lying or is Boehner lying? Who has more to gain — within his own party?
Examiner Columnist Gregory Kane is a Pulitzer-nominated news and opinion journalist who has covered people and politics from Baltimore to the Sudan.
