Hamlet said that in the Shakespeare play of the same name, and no truer statement was ever said. You should be able to look yourself in the mirror and sleep at night.
I was going door to door the other day and found myself falling into the politician's game.
What game is that?
A voter asks a question and you try to give what you think is the correct answer. You hedge, try to sound middle-of-the-road, avoid giving a strong opinion or withhold something that might be relevant to your answer.
No, I didn't lie. But when one person mentioned that they'd like to see the Prop 2-1/2 override for New Silver Beach pass, I didn't say that I was opposed to the public funding of this neighborhood project. I withheld something. An omission.
It's something we see on a daily basis from politicians. One of my supporters, who has had the ear of some of congressmen over the years, told me that the congressmen will privately tell him that something is full of %$#&, but publicly they won't say anything of the sort. Privately, there is honesty, but publicly there is hedging, withholding and glossing-over of opinions and statements.
If you've ever read my letters and editorials in the Falmouth Enterprise and Cape Cod Times, you know that I don't have a problem speaking my mind. However, for a brief moment, I forgot that this was exactly why I was running - because our selectmen are not being straight with us. Going forward, I promise to avoid behaving like a politician, and to give a straight answer to a direct question.
Scout's honor.
We CAN do better.
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