Believing One’s Own Lies

By Sherwin Pomerantz


When I was still living in Chicago some 30 years ago, I used to meet with my accountant on a regular basis who was also an investor in the company. I learned a lot of things from him but one of the lessons that was seared into my memory was that the biggest danger business owners face is believing their own lies. That is certainly true but also applies to political leaders.

In an interview aired on ABC News today, the Syrian president says that acts of violence have been committed by individuals, not ordered by the government; "No government in the world kills its people, unless it's led by a crazy person" Assad says. Syrian President Bashar Assad went on to say that he is not directly responsible for acts of violence committed by his security forces since an uprising against the Alawite president began in Syria in March of this year, and denied reports of torture by the Syrian army.

Speaking with Barbara Walters, Assad said that "There is a difference between a deliberate policy of repression, and the presence of some errors committed by some officials. There is a great difference," Assad reportedly said, adding that acts of violence were carried out by "individuals," and not ordered by the Syrian government.

According to UN figures the death toll in the embattled country has risen above 4,000 people. Assad, speaking during his first interview with an American news outlet, dismissed that figure, questioning the UN's credibility.

Well, he is certainly guilty of the warning not to believe one’s own lies. His statement that only countries led by crazy people kill their own people may make a good sound bite but is hardly borne out by fact. There have been plenty of political leaders throughout history who were sane but either convinced they were above the law, had visions of world domination or, as in Assad’s case, deathly afraid of losing power and then used those reasons to slaughter even millions of people. So one does not have to be crazy to order one’s troops to fire at will.

Earlier this week Saudi Arabia convicted an Australian Muslim there for the Hajj pilgrimage of blaspheming the name of Allah and sentenced him to two years in jail and 500 lashes. 500 lashes, of course, cannot be sustained by any human being so that is effectively a death sentence and the court’s decision, on appeal, to reduce the time in prison to one year is laughable, given the fact that the prisoner will not survive the lashings. But no one considers the leadership of Saudi Arabia crazy, do they?

In addition, given the totalitarian regime which was created by Assad’s father and continued by him, can anyone anywhere give credence to his claim that the deaths were carried out by individuals and not by order of the government? In addition to accusations by human rights groups of torture, killings, and unwarranted arrests of activists and bloggers by the Syrian armed forces, recent reports point to a new phenomenon of unknown assailants and deaths on both the pro- and anti-Assad sides.

Sadly, the ability of political leaders to believe their own lies is not limited to regimes such as Syria. There are plenty of other examples worldwide even in the west. The job of the electorate and the judicial system, in countries that still claim to be free, is to prosecute those who act on such beliefs and convict and sentence them to appropriate prison terms.

There is no doubt that here in Israel we have something less than a perfect democratic system if there is such a thing. But the fact that this morning a former President of the country began serving a seven year prison term having been convicted of sexual crimes while in office is testament to the vitality of the judicial system in the country and an example of someone prosecuted for believing his own lies. Those who are guilty of such acts are also guilty of thinking they are above the law.

Theodore Roosevelt was right when he opined “No man is above the law and no man is below it; nor do we ask his permission when we ask him to obey it.” A point well taken and still true.