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Credibility and responsibility

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Credibility and responsibility

Some years ago, in the eras of Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon, there was much talk about “the credibility gap.” The gap was the divide between what the government was telling us about the Vietnam War and what courageous war correspondents for the U.S. and foreign press were finding, and also what some veterans of the war were telling their countrymen when they came home.

The government was giving us propaganda, not truth.

And the people stopped believing the government.

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We went through a period of purging as a nation — as we looked for a little truth.

In 1968, the people elected a Republican president, even though they had overwhelmingly elected a Democratic president four years before (a loss of almost 12 million votes). In six years, that Republican was gone. And why was that? Lies. As Barry Goldwater said at the time, the American people only wanted the President to level with them. 

In 1976, the voters elected an inexperienced former governor of Georgia to be President. He was an outsider who promised he would never lie to us.

Americans understand the little white lies politicians tell. And they also understand that platforms and promises have to do with direction, not necessarily exact results. But they expect essential truthfulness and good faith from their leaders.

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When they feel that is gone, the leader is often soon gone as well, or reduced to eunuch status.

When a president loses credibility, his presidency is dead. LBJ, Nixon, and, to a lesser extent, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush prove that. The end of the second Clinton and Bush terms were times of painful paralysis.

President Donald Trump’s credibility is on the line today. He can survive the impression that he was clumsy, naive, even bullying so long as he was essentially truthful about why he fired FBI chief James Comey. We shall see.

Mayor Paula Hicks-Hudson’s credibility is also on the line. Is it really believable that she and her administration keep, unexpectedly, finding millions of dollars in myriad cubbyholes, having told the people of Toledo, only a few months ago, that the city was broke?

This defies credulity. It does not pass the smell test.

Either the mayor and her top staff really do not know where the money is, and how to count it, or they have been hiding mass sums of money for a politically rainy day. In the first instance, that would make them incompetent. In the second, dishonest. Either way, what the mayor has gained in popularity by her “finds,” she may lose in credibility.

We have also been getting a national lesson in responsibility in recent weeks: As the Wall Street Journal says of President Trump — “the buck stops everywhere else.” According to Mr. Trump, so far in his presidency nothing that has gone wrong has been the President's fault. He sometimes seems to be running against his own administration, or at least his own staff.

The same message has been delivered by Hillary Clinton, who is on what might be called “The Endless Excuses Tour.” She has blamed her loss of the presidency on Jim Comey, on sexism, on the Democratic National Committee, on the press, on the Russians, and, of course, on “the deplorables” — every American who sees the world differently than she sees it. There may be more scapegoats to come.

Hence the two people who sought the most responsible position in America are two people who cannot even take responsibility for themselves.

Can it be an accident that neither Mr. Trump nor Mrs. Clinton is a credible, reliable, believable person in the eyes of millions of Americans? Credibility ends with responsibility. Can you imagine John F. Kennedy saying after the Bay of Pigs: It’s the military’s fault? They made me do it. (This message was sent to some journalists off the record at the time. On the record, the President took full responsibility.)

There is a lesson here for Ms. Hicks-Hudson as she campaigns for another term as mayor: Be honest and take responsibility, or the voters will — rightly — abandon you.

And for her opponents who seek to be mayor, those now in the race and those who may later join, the message is the same: Tell the truth and practice accountability. Neither is simply a posture. Both require rigorous action.

And that action should start with a call for a forensic audit of city books and, second, a very specific discussion of professionalism and personnel in Toledo city government: If the city really doesn’t know how much money it has, if there is no one at Government Center who can count, then some people need to be fired and we need an influx of government professionals. Further, the people who will be brought in to run the city should be named.

The more specific the mayor and her opponents are, the more credible and responsible they will be.

Keith C. Burris is the editorial page editor of The Blade. Contact him at: kburris@theblade.com or 419-724-6266.

First Published June 11, 2017, 4:00 a.m.

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Donald Trump has had trouble admitting that he is to blame for any administration issues.  (ASSOCIATED PRESS)
Paula Hicks-Hudson and Toledo have been the beneficiary of millions of dollars in discovered money.  (THE BLADE)  Buy Image
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