Lies

The other day there were two interesting news stories about lying. First, the young man who forged documents and lied about his credentials to get himself into Harvard, then get financial aid and who knows what other benefits. I've always been fascinated by the psychology of pathological lying. I met a pathological lier many, many years ago and it was very strange. Then there was the story about Richard Blumenthal, the Connecticut Attorney General who lied about being a Viet Nam vet. I saw a few minutes of his remarks and it seemed rather pathetic: "I misspoke on a few occasions... I take full responsibility..." Blah, blah, blah. And now we have the cyclist's confession. What's his name, Landis? It gets interesting when we own up, or don't, to our deceptions.

At a different point on this spectrum: why in the world do people engage publicly in what until most recently were very clearly private conversations? I refer, of course, to Facebook. Every time I visit this strange website I am confronted with the private dialogues of others. For the most part completely innocuous stuff, but still, why do they share it?