August 17, 2009

Is the President a Pathological Liar?

Per the following definition, there is reason to ask whether President Obama is a pathological liar.

From WikiAnswers.com:

Q: How can you tell if someone is a pathological liar?

A: Identifying a Pathological Liar

Pathological liars, or "mythomaniacs," may be suffering from histrionic personality disorder or narcissistic personality disorder. The following comments basically reflect a pathological liar who has the characteristics of histrionic personality disorder.

Some characteristics

1. Exaggerates things that are ridiculous.

2. One-upping. Whatever you do, this person can do it better. You will never top them in their own mind, because they have a concerted need to be better than everyone else. This also applies to being right. If you try to confront an individual like this, no matter how lovingly and well-intentioned you might be - this will probably not be effective. It's threatening their fantasy of themselves, so they would rather argue with you and bring out the sharp knives than admit that there's anything wrong with them.

3. They "construct" a reality around themselves. They don't value the truth, especially if they don't see it as hurting anyone. If you call them on a lie and they are backed into a corner, they will act very defensively and say ugly things (most likely but depends on personality), but they may eventually start to act like, "Well, what's the difference? You're making a big deal out of nothing!" (again, to refocus the conversation to your wrongdoing instead of theirs).

4. Because these people don't value honesty, a lot of times they will not value loyalty. So watch what you tell them. They will not only tell others, but they will embellish to make you look worse. Their loyalty is fleeting, and because they are insecure people, they will find solace in confiding to whomever is in their favor at the moment.

5. They may be somewhat of a hypochondriac. This can come in especially useful when caught in a lie, for example, they can claim that they have been sick, or that there's some mysteriously "illness" that has them all stressed out. It's another excuse tool for their behavior.

6. Obviously, they will contradict what they say. This will become very clear over time. They usually aren't smart enough to keep track of so many lies (who would be?).

Examples of Lies Told by President Obama:

• August, 2009. Obama stated that AARP endorsed his health-care reform plan, saying “The AARP would not be endorsing a bill if it was undermining Medicare.” AARP responded that they had not endorsed his health-care reform plan.
• August, 2009. Obama couldn't even accurately present the facts on tennis great Billie Jean King's career, even though he was presenting her with a Medal of Freedom at the time. He stated she had achieved 12 Grand Slam titles, 101 doubles titles, and 67 singles titles. Per King, “They didn’t get any of my facts right ..... Not even in the ballpark ... [for example] the Grand Slam’s at 39 not at 12.”
• August, 2009. Obama stated at a townhall in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, that "I have not said that I was a single-payer supporter." But his own campaign website said “If I were designing a system from scratch I would probably set up a single-payer system. … So what I believe is we should set up a series of choices….Over time it may be that we end up transitioning to such a system."
• August, 2009. Obama claimed to a townhall, that doctors treating diabetics are likely to needlessly amputate feet from diabetics in return for a $30,000 to $50,000 payment. This is really a vicious lie.  The actual payment is an average of $550 to $710, and the people receiving it are surgeons, not the general practitioners and endocrinologists who are the ones who make a decision as to whether a limb cannot be saved in the case of a person with diabetes.
• June, 2009. Obama: "If you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor, period." Not even the NY Times believes this any more: "Dallas L. Salisbury, president of the Employee Benefit Research Institute, a private nonpartisan group, said: 'The president and Democrats in Congress are saying what they would like. Their promises may not be literally true because your health plan may change, and your doctor may no longer accept your insurance.'"
• May, 2009. Obama stated that health care organizations had agreed to reduce spending by 1.5 percentage points annually, for a potential savings of $2 trillion over 10 years.  But the American Hospital Association said that this was a gross misstatement, and that the deal was only to reach, after 10 years, a savings of 1.5 percentage points annually. Per the AHA, “There has been a tremendous amount of confusion and frankly a lot of political spin."
• February, 2009. Obama, in a prime-time press conference: "As I said, the one concern I’ve got on the stimulus package, in terms of the debate and listening to some of what’s been said in Congress is that there seems to be a set of folks who — I don’t doubt their sincerity — who just believe that we should do nothing. Now, if that’s their opening position or their closing position in negotiations, then we’re probably not going to make much progress, because I don’t think that’s economically sound and I don’t think what — that’s what the American people expect, is for us to stand by and do nothing." Per Ed Morrissey at HotAir: "Republicans in both the House and Senate have offered at least two alternative stimulus packages. None of them demanded that Obama 'do nothing'. In fact, it was the Congressional Budget Office and not Republicans that suggested that doing nothing might have a better effect than the Obama/Pelosi/Reid stimulus bill, as our friends at Power Line point out. This lie is particularly egregious, as Nancy Pelosi locked Republicans out of drafting the bill altogether."
• December, 2008. Obama cited Arne Duncan's qualifications to be Secretary of Education. Per USA Today: "Obama said that during a seven-year tenure, Duncan had boosted elementary school test scores 'from 38% of students meeting the standards to 67%' — a gain of 29 percentage points. But the new report found that, adjusting for changes in tests and procedures, students' pass rates grew only about 8 percentage points. ..... Blogger Alexander Russo, who writes about Chicago schools, says the findings show that nearly 15 years into mayoral control, the city school system 'isn't nearly as improved as many have been led to believe.' 'What I find particularly appalling is that Duncan and Obama — supposed champions of transparency and using research rather than ideology — have cited Chicago's inflated test scores, even though they knew the increases were exaggerated.'"
• For Obama's lies during the campaign, see this post on Obama WTF: "Obama's Documented Lies: 158 and remarkably still growing"

Analysis

Let's go through the checklist to see whether Obama appears to qualify as a pathological liar.

1. Exaggerates things that are ridiculous. Many of these lies are ridiculous exaggerations. See December, 2008 re: Arne Duncan and August, 2009, re: diabetics.

2. One-upping. Whatever you do, this person can do it better. You will never top them in their own mind, because they have a concerted need to be better than everyone else.  This seems to describe Obama's presentation of himself, i.e. what has been called "Obama's Messiah Shtick."

3. They "construct" a reality around themselves. They don't value the truth, especially if they don't see it as hurting anyone. If you call them on a lie and they are backed into a corner, they will act very defensively and say ugly things.  In terms of constructing a reality around himself, per Victor Davis Hanson: "In the Cairo speech, nearly every historical allusion was nonfactual or inexact: the fraudulent claims that Muslims were responsible for European, Chinese, and Hindu discoveries; the notion that a Christian Córdoba was an example of Islamic tolerance during the Inquisition; the politically correct canard that the Renaissance and Enlightenment were fueled by Arab learning; the idea that abolition and civil rights in the United States were accomplished without violence — as if 600,000 did not die in the Civil War, or entire swaths of Detroit, Gary, Newark, and Los Angeles did not go up in flames in the 1960s." Also, Obama frequently says ugly things about his opponents. See especially August, 2009, re: doctors who treat diabetics.

4. Because these people don't value honesty, a lot of times they will not value loyalty.  Obama is famous for throwing past associates "under the bus."

5. They may be somewhat of a hypochondriac. There have been no public reports of this in Obama yet.

6. Obviously, they will contradict what they say. This will become very clear over time. This describes Obama well. Per Victor Davis Hanson, "What is stunning about Obama’s hostile demagoguery about Bush’s War on Terror is not that he has now contradicted himself on one or two particulars. Instead, he has reversed himself on every major issue — renditions, military tribunals, intercepts, wiretaps, Predator drone attacks, the release of interrogation photos, Iraq (and, I think, soon Guantanamo Bay) — and yet never acknowledged these reversals".

Conclusion

Obama's behavior appears to match the textbook characteristics of a pathological liar.