Barron H. Lerner Quotes
In practice … presidential physicians have lied, often blatantly. Ross McIntyre, Roosevelt’s first White House physician, continually characterized his patient’s shortness of breath — from congestive heart failure — as a sinus problem. The most egregious lie, perhaps, was one of omission. When Paul Tsongas was running for president in 1992, his hematologist confirmed his patient’s history of lymphoma but not that the disease had recently recurred and thus probably was incurable. Tsongas died two days before what would have been the end of his first term in office.
Barron H. Lerner, “Five myths on presidential health”, The Washington Post, September 16, 2016
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
The CIA has never denied this, and it seems to be corroborated in that none of the CIA reports to the Presidents ever mentioned the failures and there is no CIA official who ever claimed that they informed either of the Presidents. In particular, when Kennedy initially went along with the ill-fated CIA Bay of Pigs invasion plan not realizing that the CIA had a dismal record of major misjudgments and failures of covert operations.
Agree resigned from the CIA in protest to its political position.
The quotation was given by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld just prior to the war with Iraq, 2003.
He was referring to the George W. Bush and his behavior on the Iraq War.
President Eisenhower, who had a very high degree of trust—domestically and internationally—was persuaded to lie to the country and the world about U-2 Spy Plane Program. As soon as the nation and the world, had accepted Eisenhowers word for the program, the Russians not only displayed a U-2 that they had shot down over Soviet territory, but trotted out the pilot who they had captured. Generally, American Presidents since have avoided lies until LBJ lied about the Gulf of Tonkin, Ronald Reagan lied about Irangate, Bill Clinton lied about his sex life, and George W. Bush lied about the reason for invading Iran. All these lies have turned out badly for the President and the nation.
If a government can classify embarrassing information, then it does not have to lie which is why over-classification is so prevalent. But then the officials have to lie in the classification process by claiming national security is involved as opposed to their own or their party’s security from embarrassment. Most officials prefer to tell the truth and not deceive the public. However, a large proportion have their moral instincts compromised by confusing the national interest with the politicians’ interest
Barron H. Lerner is a member of the faculty at the New York University Langone School of Medicine. He received his M.D. from Columbia in 1986 and his Ph.D. in history from the University of Washington in 1996. In addition to his research, Lerner practices internal medicine and teaches medical ethics and the history of medicine.
