22 May 2014 –

The Veterans Administration:  Entrenched Incompetence

My experience with the VA spans fifty years.  My father was wounded in WWII and never fully recovered.  The VA finally warehoused him at the hospital in Fort Harrison, near Helena, Montana.  He died in March 1963, at age forty.  At my young age, only once was I able to visit the day room of my father’s ward.  I watched disabled patients hobble around the room or sit motionless looking out the window.  I asked an orderly who these men were.  He said that they were WWII and Korean War veterans waiting to die.  No one, it seemed, was helping them, or my father, to live.  I vow to never die in a VA hospital. 

In 1978, I took my young family to Helena, Montana, to visit my mother.  I got sick and since I was in the Air Force, I went to Fort Harrison to see a doctor.  I was admitted instead of helped.  I spent the night looking out the window from the same floor where my father had died fifteen years before.  That night, an old veteran died in the bed next to mine.  In the morning, I went to take a shower as staff moved his body.  Apparently, I missed the doctor’s rounds as well and had to run him down in the stairwell.  I told the doctor I felt much better and that I was going to leave the hospital immediately whether they gave me my clothes back or not.  He shrugged and said I could leave.  My wife picked me up at the front door an hour later.  I vowed to never stay another night in a VA hospital.

In December 2008, my wife and I were in Denver visiting our son and his family.  My wife developed a serious infection, and we learned that the Fitzsimons VA Hospital handled all weekend emergency cases for active-duty personnel and their dependents.  At nearly midnight, over eight hours after entering the not-so-busy emergency room, my wife was finally seen.  With no apologies from any of the staff, my wife finally got her prescription.  I will never again go to a VA hospital emergency room under my own power.   

In September 2009, I retired from the Air Force and applied to the VA for a service-related disability.  I was told that final adjudication would take six months.  After nine months, a form letter told me it would take another six months.  Eight months later, another letter told me that I must resubmit all my paperwork.  Finally, 13 months later, 2 ½ years after my first submission, my disability was approved.  It is a slight one, so I receive little extra money in my retirement check.  The concrete result is that I now weep for my long-suffering compatriots who await just compensation for the serious disabilities that prevent them from providing for their families.  How many of them have died and will die waiting for the VA to help them?  I vow I will not die waiting for the VA to do its job.  

None of the VA’s problems are new.  They are a systemic risk in any government-provided service, even where the leaders may be good and decent people.  Indeed, only high performance standards and constant oversight keep the evils of government bureaucracy from calcifying the process. 

 

It is always a question of leadership.  We now need leaders who will jam their fingers into the chests of entrenched bureaucrats and demand performance or resignations.  We need leaders with the moral courage to risk their careers to care for those who risked their lives to fight our nation’s battles.  We need those who look at their jobs as callings—as rescue missions for their compatriots.  We need leaders the mention of whose names makes self-serving bureaucrats tremble.  Leaders, not managers. 

Neither the present VA hierarchy nor the administration that appointed them has shown such courageous leadership.  Also, such moral courage certainly won’t be found in the administrators of the upcoming civilian version of the VA—the murderous monster rising out of the radioactive bog called Obamacare.  Paraphrasing President Nixon as he described the coterie of generals who ran the Vietnam war:  There wasn’t a General Patton among them.  Now, as then, we need a Patton.  In the White House and in the VA.  Until then, I repeat my vow:  I refuse to die in a VA hospital.  Send comments to Mac Coleman at mac.coleman.colonel@gmail.com.  

27 March 2014 –

Is Anyone In Charge Around Here?

From 1992 to 1996, I was stationed at the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe, in Mons, Belgium.  It was the military headquarters for NATO in Europe.  I was the Military Assistant and Speechwriter to NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe, General George A. Joulwan.  It was an exciting time to be in uniform in Europe.  In the three previous years, the Berlin Wall had fallen, the Soviet Union had dissolved, the Warsaw Pact had collapsed, diverse ethnic groups in the Former Yugoslavia were fomenting horrific genocide, and against Iraq in DESERT SHIELD and DESERT STORM, the finest military the world had ever seen had laid waste to the enemy.  Indeed, the world’s power structures were changing.  The United States needed a grand strategy to ensure that what would emerge would be in our best political, diplomatic, economic, and military interests. 

NATO’s leadership responded with the “New NATO” strategy.  Despite the collapse of the “Evil Empire”, the “New NATO” would reduce neither in membership nor in span of influence.  In fact, newe programs would eventually offer NATO’s proven formula of collective security and the prosperity it engendered to the newly liberated countries of Eastern Europe.  As well, to stop the ethnic-based massacres in the Balkans, NATO would carefully execute its first-ever out-of-area military operations.  The “New NATO” concept was a dynamic response to huge strategic challenges.  Strong U.S. leadership was needed to lead this, the U.S.’s most important alliance, into the future.

I wrote over 600 speeches, toasts, book chapters, position and background papers, and talking point outlines to stress that the “New NATO” would build on the strengths of the old NATO as it responded to the new challenges of Europe’s collective security.  Those strengths were simple to express and apply today as they did twenty years ago: committed U.S. leadership in the military and diplomatic arms of the alliance; continued presence of strong U.S. military forces in Europe; and, firm assurance by all NATO members to commit diplomatic and military resources if any NATO member were threatened by outside forces.  The eastern border of NATO would no longer run through a divided Germany and may someday be on the eastern border of the Baltic state of Estonia, but the mission of the alliance would  not change.  A strong NATO would ensure the peace and prosperity of its members through the coordinated and strong military capability of its members.  No economic, political, or diplomatic, mechanism such as the G-7, the European Union, or the UN could provide such peace.  NATO succeeded.  The New NATO also succeeded.    

Is today’s NATO working?  No.  It is failing because the United States has not fulfilled its continued role of strong and committed military leader.  Given Europe’s location on the map, what peoples inhabit and dominate that small continent, and where the strategic resources of the world are found, Europe will always need its U.S. cousins to be vitally involved in its strategic decision-making and in its day-to-day defense.  The American translation: it is in the United States’ compelling strategic interests to keep Europe peaceful and prosperous.  There always will be truth in the statement that NATO’s mission is to keep the United States in, Russia out, and Germany down. 

Dangerously, our current administration in particular cut back our deployed conventional forces and cancelled the deployment of a strategic missile defense capability in NATO.  They justify this by saying that we are now living in a post-cold-war world.  That statement shows that neither President Obama nor his advisors understand much about historic ethnic, cultural, and economic forces and their currency in today’s world.  The forces that caused most European conflicts from the 19^th into the 21^st century are stolidly grinding away at the European peace and security in places such as the Ukraine, the Balkans, and Turkey.  Europe’s instability threatens U.S. strategic interests, and, if left unanswered, our sovereignty. 

Are we too late to recover from our neglect of this most important responsibility?  No.  But, the President must declare now that our strategic interests in Europe are threatened, that we must immediately bolster our military commitment to the NATO alliance, and that our friends and allies in Europe extend to the Baltic, the Black Sea, and deep into the plains of Eastern Europe.  He must say it so that our allies will believe it and stand with us.  Russian leader Vladimir Putin understands only such strength.  Leading from behind is not an option for today’s Commander-in-Chief.  NATO’s challenges have always demanded more than that.  

20 March 2014 - 

Who’s in charge around here, anyway?  Part II

“Sovereignty: supreme and independent power or authority in government, as possessed or claimed by a state or community. “  -- Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary.

For at least a generation, the U.S. has not adequately controlled its borders.  The resulting unfettered movement of foreigners in and out of the United States has become a pressing threat to our sovereignty.  

In the absence of decisive lawmakers making sensible U.S. law and policy, foreign authorities, powers, and peoples are wielding increasing influence over what should be the exclusive domain of the citizens of the United States.   The power to ensure that the rule of law reflects our, the citizens’, wishes – i.e., our very sovereignty -- has seriously diminished because of our refusal to see this as something other than an economic or political issue. 

       

I have observed throughout the world that if someone enters a country illegally, his expectations to thrive there will depend on continued illegal activity.  His subsequent actions will include nonpayment of taxes, driving without a license, using false identity papers, bribing officials, moving around the country illegally, etc. Such acts eventually infect surrounding citizens as well, and the nation’s sovereignty and its rule of law begin to erode.

How do we impress upon our citizenry the importance of sovereignty and responsibility?  Our leaders could start by implementing a sensible policy of vigorously enforcing existing immigration laws and then of selectively changing those laws that wear away our sovereignty.  

Obviously, few politicians seem to be in a pressing hurry to implement such straightforward immigration reform.  Therefore, I suggest a slightly different approach. 

Perhaps, English language classes, including English as a Second Language (ESL), in our high schools, junior colleges, and community education programs would be a good venue to precisely present the facts of illegal immigration.  For example, teaching the twelve English verb tenses would be very useful in presenting this information. 

        

Simple Present. Many of my compadres and I enter the U.S. illegally.

Simple Past. Because I needed work and my home country was in such horrible straits, I entered the U.S. illegally.

Simple Future. If I am ever deported again, I will enter the U.S. again illegally. 

Present Progressive. Because the U.S. government insists that its southern border stay so open, I am reentering the U.S. illegally today.

Past Progressive. The border is porous and U.S. border patrol forces are bound by restrictive rules of engagement; therefore, I threw rocks at the border guards last week so they would leave me alone when I was entering the U.S. illegally. 

Future Progressive. Because your country can neither get its laws in order nor enforce them, my friends and family have been crossing U.S. borders illegally for many years. 

Present Perfect. This is a sanctuary city, so it doesn’t matter that I have entered the U.S. illegally.

Past Perfect, Is my son an American or an “anchor baby” because my wife and I had entered the U.S. illegally before he was born? 

Future Perfect.  Before the U.S. government finally commits itself to enforcing legitimate forms of sovereignty, millions more people will have entered the U.S. illegally. 

Present Perfect Progressive. Although it might be painful for those who consider the rule of law and sovereignty essential to the nation’s security, I will have been living illegally in the U.S. for most of my life before immigration reforms are finally enacted and enforced. 

Past Perfect Progressive.  Other people had been entering the U.S. illegally long before I did.  Today, if my fellow 11.7 million illegal immigrants lived together, we would make the seventh largest state in the union.  That would be a lot of electoral votes, especially if amnesty were the heart of immigration reform. 

Future Perfect Progressive.  By 2020, some estimate that sufficient numbers of illegal immigrants will have been entering the United States to push our total to over twenty million. 

Review. By 2020, most illegal immigrants will have come from Latin America.  This influx of illegal immigrants is a regional phenomenon that has little to do with language, culture, or ethnicity, but has everything to do with proximity. 

Millions of people from other countries want to live in the United States.  They would come here any way they could, legally or illegally.  Probably the only reason there aren’t tens of millions of illegal Africans streaming here is because the Atlantic Ocean is a lot wider than the Rio Grande River. 

Comment at mac.coleman.colonel@gmail.com.

10 March 2014 –

Who’s in charge around here, anyway? 

“Sovereignty: supreme and independent power or authority in government as possessed or claimed by a state or community. “  -- Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary.

The current crisis in the Ukraine highlights Russia’s efforts to dominate Eastern Europe.  Russia is exploiting our administration’s fundamental neglect of its primary duty to safeguard the U.S.’s interests in the world.  Our administration has no viable strategy to use its instruments of national power—economic, military, and diplomatic—to maintain the U.S.’s sovereignty and our influence and security in the world.  Power abhors such a vacuum of intent and action, and the lesser power mongers of the world are exhibiting their plans to exploit that space.

Deploying troops to the Crimea is Russia’s latest step in taking advantage of local instability in order to dominate the vassal states of the former Soviet Union.  Since the early 1990s, Russia has supported separatist movements in surrounding countries in an attempt to place subservient governments in power to be dominated in the future.  In 2008, Russian troops entered rebellious regions in Georgia to fight alongside separatists against government troops.  The Bush administration did little to help Georgia or to dissuade Russia’s aggression.  Russia paid no penalty for its expansion of regional dominance, and Georgia’s aspirations to enter NATO died.  My military and diplomatic contacts from the region expressed dismay, but then pragmatically accepted that Georgia would remain beyond the U.S.’s attainable interests in Europe.  Our influence withered on the outer edges of Europe, and Russia’s dominance grew.  Our sovereignty weakened.

President Obama then announced in 2009 the scrapping of a proposed Bush-era antiballistic missile shield system in Poland and the Czech Republic.  My Eastern European contacts were unanimous in their assessments:  the U.S. gave Russia carte blanche to again dominate Eastern Europe economically, militarily, and diplomatically.  My friends were specifically concerned that the expansion of NATO deep into Eastern Europe, while welcome, would not have the deterrent power it had during the Cold War because the U.S. did not show sufficient military commitment.  One officer had hoped that the ethnic Poles and Czechs in President Obama’s home city, Chicago, would have protested more loudly against his abandonment of their relatives.  My friend had hoped that the U.S. would be exceptional in the world.  Alas, he said, our President is ordinary. 

Our unilateral dismantlement of military and diplomatic power has made it harder to wield U. S. influence, particularly in Eastern Europe.  The edge of our sovereignty has withered even further west, snubbing many of our allies and friends. 

So, Russia has reentered the power vacuum.  Russia assessed it was worth the risk to militarily occupy what international treaty had declared to be Ukrainian territory.  The Crimea, with its Russian naval and air bases, is critical to Russia’s dominance of the Black Sea and to Russia’s influence on Turkey for naval access to the Mediterranean.  Russia will soon control the peninsula under a Russian flag.  Russia’s sovereignty, concentrated in strongman Vladimir Putin, is ascending.  The U.S.’s sovereignty, weakly expressed by the executive and legislative branches of government, is descending.

What instruments of national power can we bolster to stop this strategically erosive trend?  

First, we should expand domestic energy production, particularly natural gas.  We can soon become a legitimate competitor with Russia in the European market, increasing our influence and decreasing Russia’s.  To do this, President Obama must lift his moratorium on exercising drilling leases on federal lands.   He should approve the Keystone pipeline immediately.  The subsequent, strategic shift in the energy market would benefit the U.S. more than any other country.  Our bolstered economic instrument of national power would greatly strengthen U.S. sovereignty at home and U.S. influence abroad.

We also should invigorate our military ties with our allies and increase our military capability in the regions surrounding Russia.  Our existing treaty mechanisms are rusty, but they’re not corroded beyond repair.  We should give Eastern Europeans a reason to contribute to and feel protected by NATO.  We should give countries a reason to aspire to join with the U.S. and her allies in the common defense of borders and economies.  With a dwindling military, we can’t do this. 

A strong economy and effective military best protect our vital interests in the world when they operate under a clear and grand strategy to maintain US. sovereignty.  We can then wield our diplomatic instrument of national power with strength.  Our diplomats can then be polite and soft-spoken because our opponents will hear a clear message:  we have set the edges of our interests and we will protect them well.  Until then, it’s President Putin’s game, and he will continue to play it well.     

26 February 2014 - 

An Every-Day Morning in Houston

This morning, my wife suggested gently that spending some time out of the house would blunt my desire to write a political screed and would put me in a better mood. 

OK.  So, I donned my best Hawaiian shirt, tucked it into a clean pair of cargo pants, and chose good black socks to go with my fifteen-dollar tennis shoes; just right for a couple of hours at WalMart. Friends often meet for conversation at the McDonald’s there, and I looked forward to their enlightening me about the issues of the day. And, I would pick up some things for the house.   My wife gave me a short list of groceries, kissed me quickly, and I was out the door.

The late winter drizzle and fog clouded the windshield, but not enough to keep the wipers on all the time.   What's more, everybody was driving too fast.  There ought to be a law.  It reminded me of summers in Belgium; low clouds and fog and mist and little direct sun. No wonder the bars there open at nine in the morning. 

The eight miles passed without incident, and I pulled into the WalMart parking lot.

None of my friends were sitting in McDonalds.  I thanked the greeter for the proffered shopping cart, pulled out my grocery list, and started on my chore.   I needed milk, cereal, and romaine lettuce.  That was the easy part.  With plenty of time left, I also figured that a couple bars of deluxe chocolate would probably improve my standing at home. After discussing the merits of various chocolates with two WalMart associates, I threw a dark chocolate bar and a black currant chocolate bar into the shopping cart and left the aisle. My wife would be impressed with the classier-than-milk dark chocolate.

In the cracker and cookie aisle, I passed another old guy in a Hawaiian shirt and tennis shoes. His shirttail was out, and he was wearing white socks. No class at all.  There ought to be a law.  I chose some cookies my wife likes—double stuffed Oreos—and some Ritz crackers for me.  Cookies are always a good bet,and adding a fourth or fifth box of my favorite crackers is a prudent thing to do in case of an emergency.

As I cruised the remaining food aisles, I realized that I was just about at the median age for shoppers early on a Monday morning. There also were a number of young mothers, each pushing a cart with one small child.  One of the little girls even smiled and reached out to me.  We talked and laughed for a minute.   There also were two women and a man in motorized carts navigating the aisles. Everything seemed normal in grocery-town U.S.A.

There was much more to see.  But, by then, the women’s clothing section was between me and the rest of the store; so, I decided to forego further shopping.  On the way to the check-out counter, I grabbed two bottles of cranberry juice and a 42oz. bag of M & Ms. They used to sell 56oz. bags for about the same price. Now, we get 30% less. Outrageous!  There ought to be a law.

Walking past McDonalds as I left, I saw that my friends’ and my table had been taken over by three mothers, with their babies in huge baby strollers.  They all seemed to be speaking at once.  I’ve seen this phenomenon many times: an estrogen mist descends on the table and excludes everything male.   My old-guy friends will understand when I tell them.   Then, we will pull out pictures of our grandkids and admire them. 

It cost $36.83 for the milk, cereal, and romaine lettuce.  And the cookies and crackers.  And the juice.  And the chocolate.  On the drive home, I realized that I’d bought enough stuff to pay a lot of money, but not enough stuff to eliminate the need to make another trip to the grocery store this week. Oops!

At home, the chocolate and cookies were well received. The fact that I was gone only two hours was, well… less well received.  I figured I could salvage the day by spending the afternoon upstairs: writing, reading, and looking for a legitimate day job.

Maybe this is the way politicians get started: spending the morning talking with and judging people, trying to make up for their ineptitude with largesse, and spending a lot of money in the process.

19 February 2014 – 

What You Do, What You Are  

There are two kinds of people in the world:  those who break rules, feel remorse, and vow not to break them again; and, those who break rules, figure out how to break them again, and feel remorse  only when they get caught.  A corollary truth:  most people are good, but not very.

 

An orderly society requires good leaders chosen from the first group.  

       

I learned this as an Air Force officer.  Now, as then, ordinary people are required to become extraordinary Airmen, working in a rigid bureaucracy where individual efforts are subordinate to the success of the organization.   They need commanders and senior non-commissioned officers who uphold the rules of the organization, and who champion the guiding principles upon which the rules rest.  Airmen become extraordinary when they follow leaders who enforce the rules and sacrifice their personal desires to the needs of the Air Force. 

    

When a squadron commander breaks the rules, or puts his own success before that of his organization and of those he commands, good order and discipline soon collapse.  Airmen quickly see that their commander is nothing more than ordinary, and many revert to breaking rules and being ordinary themselves.  The organization then soon becomes a government-funded collection of self-serving individuals and groups.  Money and effort are wasted in an ineptly-run organization.    Only a new commander can rejuvenate such a squadron, and only through reestablishing adherence to the rules and to the organization.  

There are strong parallels between a bad Air Force squadron commander and today’s federal government leaders.  We elected members of Congress and the President.  For the nation to thrive, these leaders must follow the rules.  They must demonstrate primary allegiance to the nation’s fundamental laws embodied in the Constitution.  They must also be prepared to sacrifice personal or political goals for the greater good of the people and the nation. 

Our leaders’ allegiances appear to be far from where they should be.  These leaders reek of the ordinary. 

For five years the President and members of the Senate have refused to submit, pass, and sign a Constitutionally-mandated budget.  Last month’s huge spending bill was only a stopgap, passed in order to postpone the next budget fight until after the November elections.  Our extraordinary Founders knew that there is no accountability where there is no budget.  Our leaders are putting party and personal desires ahead of Constitutional mandates.  Meanwhile, they suffer none of the consequences of their actions.  Are the leaders who control the White House and the Senate so ordinary that not one of them will speak out for obeying the rules?  

Congress legislates; the President implements.   Extraordinary leaders accept that.  Ordinary politicians ignore it. 

The President’s legacy legislation, the Affordable Care Act (ACA), was passed through both houses of Congress without a single Republican vote.  So be it; legislators followed the rules.  But, the ACA also is the most poorly-designed and poorly-implemented piece of major legislation in our lifetime.  Even Democrat Congressmen and Senators are now speaking out against the circus that is Obamacare.  Their actions may be the understandable moves of ordinary politicians whose districts are full of increasingly upset constituents.  Or maybe they’re demonstrating the beginnings of pragmatic leadership over partisanship.  We can only hope.

The President, however, consistently actually breaks the rules of the Constitution -- which he claims to understand -- by unilaterally delaying implementation of critical parts of the ACA.  And he shows no signs of stopping.   

Finally, myriad federal agencies are charting their own paths under current national leadership. These agencies don’t need guidance to be self-serving.  If left untended, bureaucracies naturally expand, conceal their corruption, and resist threats to their accrued power.  Bureaucracies breed natural enemies to the Constitution and to the liberties of a sovereign country.   IRS scandals, the State Department’s action and inaction surrounding Benghazi, the Department of Justice’s aggressive opposition to the Supreme Court’s decision that parts of the 1965 Civil Rights Voting Act no longer apply today.  These are the acts of ordinary partisan agency and department heads who, with no extraordinary and honorable examples to follow, have been left to their own devices. 

The rise of the bureaucratic state should demand that leaders in Congress clearly define agencies’ missions and fund them carefully.  Even more, this rise must demand that the President show more allegiance to the Constitution than to his pen and telephone.   

Anything short of that type of leadership does not befit a squadron commander and certainly does not befit those who should be running this country. 

6 February 2014 – 

Are You Sure That’s What You Want to Say?

Thirty-five years ago, the Air Force told me I was going to be an intelligence officer.  I filled out a mountain of paperwork in order to get a top secret, special compartmented intelligence clearance upon entering active duty.  Not being in control of my life’s story started that day. 

I was required to list every place I had lived, what I did when I was there, and provide the names of people who knew me at the time.  A special investigator asked me about my lifestyle, if I had a criminal record, used drugs, or associated with subversive groups. He also delved into my spending habits.  My answers were simple.  Boring lifestyle, no criminal record, nothing more subversive than the Eagles Lodge in my hometown, and I think I had smelled marijuana once.  Nothing to hide.  I flippantly added that I was a married student with two children; I had no money to spend. 

The investigator glared at me. Everybody has something to hide, he said.  It would be best to tell him all my secrets because if he were to find something later that I had failed to disclose, I might not receive a clearance and might not even be commissioned.  Trust had to be established at the beginning or it never would be established, he warned.  I told him I would remember his advice, but that I simply had nothing else to tell him.  

I’ve never forgotten that interview.

Every five years for the next thirty years of my Air Force career I had to update my security clearance and answer the same questions.  My life’s story, the narrative of who I am and what I do, has long been captured and held by somebody else.  The Air Force regularly verified every aspect of my life before it, as an organization, continued to trust me with classified information and with the authority to act in its name.  As long as I stayed honest and accurate with my narrative, I remained the Air Force’s trusted agent.  Looking back, I am as proud of maintaining the Air Force’s trust as I am of any impressive or exciting thing I may have done in uniform. 

Establishing and maintaining trust with those whom we serve should be the dominant standard for all who want to be elected to political office as well.  Our narrative should be precise and truthful; it’s the only sure way to be believed.  That doesn’t mean a politician’s life won’t include difficult moments or occasions of less-than-stellar decision-making.  Nobody’s perfect.  But when the truth is obscured, reworked, or sidestepped, somebody’s going to pay.

Texas State Senator Wendy Davis, a gubernatorial hopeful, learned this painful lesson when she stre-e-etched her personal narrative.  She was indeed a young, divorced mother who persevered and succeeded in school and politics.  It’s a compelling story.  But, she stretched the dates of her early years of marriage and divorce in order to gain emotional support from her constituents.  And, she got caught.  Accurate marriage and divorce dates, combined with an explanation of who paid for her elite schooling and when he paid for it, now present the narrative of an apparent self-serving gold digger who would do pretty much anything and abandon even her children to get what she wanted.  Somehow, Ms. Davis missed the important advice that false narratives are fodder for political opponents who revel in exposing them.  These opponents knew, as Wendy Davis apparently did not, that if you do not tell the truth about your own life, somebody else will.

A particularly sobering warning in the Information Age is that now, more than ever, embellishments and lies will be discovered and displayed.  All e-mails, tweets, phone calls, and written communications eventually find themselves in some data base somewhere.  The opposition party will lead the effort to find these damaging secrets; that is what opposition parties do.  Then, when the moment is most advantageous, the opposition will make the lies public and try to destroy the liar.  Even war is more polite than politics.

Here’s the question:  should voters trust anything a politician says or does in political life if he has already shown he lied about his life’s narrative?  I suggest that we trust him at our peril.   A career in the business of political/military secrets has convinced me that trustworthiness is the greatest virtue one needs to rise from politician to statesman.  Heaven knows we need such statesmen as leaders right now.