Scandal, Evasion and Distraction: A Flow Chart of Modern Government.

What is it that leads governments to believe that they can hide, evade or deny their actions and the scandals they create?

Take this ridiculous example. Everyone, EVERYONE! knows there are people being tortured in Afghanistan, indeed it would be much more newsworthy to have a headline that read; "No Afghan Prisoners Have Been Tortured", and to have it be true.

The level of evasion necessary for the PMO and the government to claim that they "didn't know" is Herculean, but only slightly more so than that required by the opposition parties, the press' talking heads and us dumb voters to act surprised and outraged by it.

But this story is a mere blip on the radar. Much more important is the question why Governments think that they can hide things like this? What are they hoping to do? I believe there is a pattern here... scandal, evade, distract, (repeat if necessary).

Here's my theory...

All governments start off like the Hollywood starlet with the good girl image, and we voters are like smitten fans, happy (for the most part) with the choice we have made in the aftermath of an election.

But this electoral honeymoon is short lived. It doesn't take long before our sweetheart is rumored to be less than pure, and sure enough the sex tape emerges.

Our governments in scandal are just like that starlet. They divorce their actions from any possible repercussions. Then even when they are discovered on all fours taking it like a pro (metaphorically speaking) they deny even the possibility that they have done anything wrong.

We, voters (fans) are left either sputtering in disbelief, or cynically nodding our heads in disgust, but only for so long, only until the next political porn, a fiasco, another boondoggle, some scandal, heaven forbid there be a somethingorother-gate.

Then, not unlike the pathetic guy watching that starlet's home video, we are distracted by the next outrage, more outrageous than the last outrage.

So we go, from scandal to scandal, but rarely do we do anything other than bitch about it over coffee, because...

"did you hear...???"