The WaPo’s Dan Froomkin and Slate’s John Dickerson wrote items today on one of my favorite subjects: Bush’s dishonesty. Both used the recent example of the president [tag]lying[/tag] about former Treasury Secretary John Snow’s resignation to explore presidential “[tag]fib[/tag]s,” “[tag]misstatement[/tag]s,” and “[tag]deception[/tag]s,” and to question why the word “[tag]lie[/tag]” just doesn’t make it into print very often when it comes to the president.
But the pieces got me thinking: what if we were to have some kind of contest that collected and ranked [tag]Bush[/tag]’s [tag]lies[/tag]?
In September 2003, the Washington Monthly published “The [tag]Mendacity[/tag] Index,” which asked a nominating committee of noted journalists and pundits to pick the most serious presidential untruths from the last four [tag]president[/tag]s. The lists were then presented to a panel of judges, who ranked each deception on a scale of 1 (least serious) to 5 (most serious). Bush, for what it’s worth, “won” by having the most serious lies. That, of course, was nearly three years ago.
Also, David Corn wrote a book called, appropriately enough, “The Lies of [tag]George W. Bush[/tag].” It’s a terrific book, but it was published in May 2004, and the president hasn’t grown more forthcoming since.
So, let me throw out an idea here. Let’s open the floor to nominations for Bush’s biggest lies since he took office in January 2001. The examples can be about any subject. If we can put together, say, 64 of them, I’ll organize them into a March Madness-style bracket, and let readers vote on which ones are the most serious whoppers of them all. It sounds like a fun summer project.
In comments, you can either a) tell me if this sounds like a good project to take on; or b) go ahead and make a nomination. The floor is yours.