Our Scott Martelle has a review in today's Los Angeles Times of Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist James B. Stewart's new book on lies - "Tangled Webs: How False Statements Are Undermining America: From Martha Stewart to Bernie Madoff." Martelle likes it:
For a nation whose romanticized history includes a young George Washington confessing to chopping down a cherry tree because he "cannot tell a lie," we seem to do an awful lot of lying. But then, the story about Washington is a lie itself, so maybe we're just being true to our national character.
In his new book, "Tangled Webs," Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist James B. Stewart dives deeply into four recent cases of high-profile conspiracies of lies. What he finds does not say good things about us.
Starting with former presidential advisor Karl Rove, Stewart argues that quite often presumably honorable people do dishonorable things. The reasons are myriad, but there are common threads. A sense of hubris that no one will find out. Fear of exposure of a misdeed. Calculated risk. Greed or misplaced loyalty.
The repercussions can be severe, particularly in a legal system predicated upon the belief that people under oath will tell the truth.
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