Keller @ Large: We Should Be Honest And Humble

BOSTON (CBS) - To people who truly believed that the Obama administration represented a superior level of competence and leadership, who swallowed as truth all the political spin they put out about keeping your own plan if you like it and the dawn of a new era of cheaper health care, you have my sympathies.

You were conned by clever political operatives who think they know more than they do and consider falsehoods to be pure truth if they're the ones spewing them.

Listen to Jon's commentary:

But if it makes you feel any better, you have plenty of bipartisan company.

Go ahead, name a presidential administration in our lifetime that hasn't offered its share of unjustified arrogance, or dishonest manipulation, or gross ineptitude, or all three. OK, maybe I'd give Gerald Ford a pass, but he wasn't in there long enough to really mess up.

Perhaps that speaks more to the impossibility of the job than the venality of the men who've held it.

But let's not pretend that these unfortunate character flaws are unique to the presidency.

The ancient Greek philosopher Diogenes roamed the streets in the daytime with a lamp, claiming to be searching for an honest man. Twenty-three centuries later, it's still special when you find someone who plays it straight, doesn't cut corners, and insists on giving and receiving the truth.

But they are out there. I meet quite a few of them in my travels, even in the political world, where many well-meaning people fall into the trap of believing self-serving ends justify dishonest means.

It's not easy to be honest and humble, but it can be done, and ought to be aspired to.

Too bad it's become an article of faith in our big-time political culture that those qualities are for losers.

You can listen to Keller At Large on WBZ News Radio every weekday at 7:55 a.m. You can also watch Jon on WBZ-TV News.

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