How can we restore honesty to our country when there is so much dishonesty that we do not even notice it?
Dishonesty is everywhere. Take junk mail -- a lot of it tries to pretend that it is something other than what it is, so you will open it. They make it look like checks or telegrams or with handwritten addresses. They put a piece of plastic in it with embossed numbers so it feels like a credit card. We arent even upset any more with this lying. We just rate it as clever ( it got us to open the envelope) or stupid. There are people who get paid very good money for thinking up these new, creative ways of lying, and we respect their abilities and admire their success and wonder if we have enough creativity to be able to do their job and make the money they do. The business is called direct marketing, and it is an important part of our free enterprise economy, just as respectable as any other business specialty.
And then we wonder why people are not as honest as they used to be. while the answer is staring us in the face -- our own attitudes and reactions.
