Millions of Americans, the majority of them women, are even now hoping against hope that the Clintons haven’t been liars all along.

What does it mean to hope against hope? In this case, I’d say it means their hope, that the story of the blue dress was just one little instance of error in an otherwise blameless career for the President of the United States and his First Lady, has just about evaporated entirely. Because–the pattern continues and becomes ever more blatant, raising the suspicion that deception isn’t just a protective response on their part, but a standard operating procedure. If the hope persists, it’s only because it’s even harder to believe that the deception of the American people has been going on a lot longer than the past eight years.

How was it possible?

It turns out that ordinary people, who don’t make a living trying to ferret out the truth (that it has to be ferreted out should tell us something), are very easy to lie to. Mostly that’s because consummate liars have a keen sense of what people want to hear and that’s what they tell them. This, no doubt, accounts for the specification of “the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth”–a recognition that leaving things out or adding then in, like putting lipstick on a pig, can alter the picture or distract us from what’s really going on. In addition, since modern day media are inclined to be complicit, deception becomes ever easier. Never mind that most of the time it’s not even illegal.

What’s the motivation? While most people are reluctant to reveal when they’ve committed a mistake and, wanting to save themselves the embarrassment of having it bruited about or even whispered by the gossips, try to cover up or even deny any evidence of the fact that they’re not as clever as they thought, because that’s not what they’re about, the behavior of the habitual liar is different and more difficult to recognize. The habitual liar has no interest in self-protection; the habitual liar is into self-promotion and takes advantage of other people’s normal credulity to that end. That is, deception is an end in itself; it gives rise to a sense of potency, of having more power than the objects of his deception. Which is what the deceiver craves. Where the ordinary mortal is concerned with not being perceived as somewhat less than the norm, the practiced deceiver is aiming much higher.

Clearly, the “low expectations” in the title don’t refer to what the Clintons aim to achieve. Rather, low expectations, or perhaps I should say “low estimations” of other people’s acuity and awareness is where they begin. Which perhaps accounts for why their deceptions have become increasingly blatant; to the point where, at times, it seems they are daring the public to call them out on their lies and even enlist the media in carrying their deceptions off.

Making the media complicit is particularly easy because, having devolved into an institution that merely “reports” or repeats whatever information (or gossip) it comes across, the press has no interest in truth or the accuracy of fact. Rather, in the interest of balance, what’s important to the media is to find an equivalent bit of information on the “other” side (as in the judicial system, there always has to be an other side). Consequently, as the Canada/NAFTA kerfuffle reveals, all that’s required to give a story “legs” is to put out a bit of disinformation (or partial truth about a contact with the Canadian embassy), wait for the media to develop some tidbit of peripheral relevance (that somebody paid a visit to Canada at some time), and then pounce with a deceptive accusation to complete the script.

Whether or not the false NAFTA story influenced the choices of Ohio primary voters, is not all that important. By alleging that the Obama campaign was simply pretending concern about the treaty’s inequities when, in fact, that represents the Clinton attitude (not surprising since NAFTA was a Bush/Clinton/Rockefeller initiative), Clinton perpetrated a deception on the electorate. That’s what we should all be incensed about. Period.

You know, it was generally accepted for a couple of decades that it was the Republican party which, for whatever reason, had begun to resort to the politics of personal destruction as a permanent strategy; that, instead of contesting political issues and the direction of social programs, Republicans aim to destroy the reputations and denigrate the achievements of those with whom they disagree. But, upon close reflection, it’s increasingly obvious that this pattern– aiming to destroy the competition, rather than striving for common goals–has infected more than the Republican party. It’s taken root in our economy and crept into at least one segment (generally referred to as the DLC) of the Democratic party, as well.

Perhaps it’s just a matter of public relations and product promotion having been imported from the commercial into the political realm. If so, then the substitution of emotional impulse and potentiation for product quality and performance as acceptable criteria for making decisions, already demonstrably detrimental in the marketing of goods and services, has been responsible for the most disastrous decade in our nation’s history. And, if we don’t call a halt now, it’s likely to continue, since the Clinton wing of the Democratic party seems every bit as committed to deception as the Republicans. (Which may well account for why Clinton and McCain give the appearance of making common cause).

One is tempted to conclude, “it’s the deception, stupid,” were it not for the fact that it’s exactly this condescending attitude which, like that old chestnut, “buyer beware,” leads to blame for the victim, rather than the crook. Was it Eve’s fault that she was misled by Satan. No doubt, he’d like you to think so. It’s part of his game. Everybody deserves to be deceived. The innocent get blamed for the most abysmal behavior that’s visited on them, because they’re naive.