George W. Bush with then Portuguese prime minister Jose Manuel Durao Barroso, Tony Blair, and Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar. Pubic Domain.
Is the role of lies in politics getting worse? Have we entered a ‘post-truth’ era as it is claimed (just recently in The Economist among many examples)? Is the “brazen disregard for facts” that marked the UK’s recent referendum a qualitative shift, as Guardian Editor-in-Chief Katharine Viner sets out, in her argument for asserting qualities of honesty and respect on the web. Or are such concerns a storm-in-the-elite stirred up to displace attention from the real issues posed, however demagogically, by the rise of a populist right? Issues that 83% of people want to be solved by policies that are evidence based, as Tracey Brown of Sense about Science argues eloquently in a recent Guardian article.
I’ve a specific starting point. Working on the implications of Brexit I’m struck by the sheer venom of many on the Remain side directed at the lies of the Brexiteers for having won the vote fraudulently. Yes, they lied. Emphasising this aspect of Brexit, however, can imply that the Remain side was honest. True, vote Leave was more cunning in its deceit, but I’ll argue that the government with its greater power and authority was the more profoundly fraudulent – and it set the terms.
