Two lies: The consequences of presidential deception (Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Ronald Reagan)

The following dissertation examines in great detail two examples of presidential lies and together with their long-term impact on the president's fortunes, those of his administration and those of the nation. The examples are President Roosevelt's description of the agreements he made at Yalta upon his return and President Kennedy's refusal to admit to the deal he made with the Soviet Union to end the Cuban missile crisis.; In the cases of both FDR and JFK, each man died before the fruits of his lies became evident. But also in both cases, the policies that each man sought to protect with his lies were undermined in part by the lies themselves. In the case of FDR, the result was a bitter “Cold War” between the US and the USSR that explicitly destroyed his hopes for a peaceful postwar alliance. In the case of Kennedy, the missile crisis helped lead indirectly to a US-USSR missile race, the splintering of the Atlantic alliance, the illusion of invincibility in Vietnam and the ultimate destruction of his successor's presidency, along with much of the nation's sense of peace and self-confidence. In the literature of “path dependency,” it is the “causal mechanism” that inspires the “inherent logic of events.” When presidents lie, their lies set off a series of reactions in the political system that builds on itself and can easily spiral out of control. These events require presidential actions which inspire more reaction and, hence more action, ad infinitem. In the meantime, the original problem that inspired the lie is frequently left to fester while the president is addressing the consequences of his mendacity.; In neither case examined here—indeed, in none of the cases in the larger study—would the president's political fortunes have likely been seriously threatened by the revelation of their actions. President Roosevelt's popularity at the end of World War II was virtually unchallengeable. And while President Kennedy might have experienced some political discomfort, particularly during the 1962 mid-term elections had the truth of his actions been exposed to the nation, the damage would certainly have been both minimal and temporary. Neither can either man claim that the nation's interests demanded a lie. Each was seeking to avoid little more than political inconvenience. Each was drawing on a long tradition of presidential duplicity and taking advantage of an obsequious media and a trusting and frequently ignorant citizenry. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)...