It was early evening and the usual group was waiting out the rush hour at the Elvis the King Luncheonette, corner of Third and Fourth.
 
It'd taken longer than usual to wrap up my copy for the evening edition, and I was a little late and a little out of breath when I slid into the big circular booth in the back. There were six of us seated around the white Formica table: Harold, the Lying Entrepreneur; the Fenderman twins -- Byron and Shelley -- from Winged Victory Auto Body; Doreen the Second Assistant; Gunter the Ex-European; and me. I ordered coffee and drank it slowly; Wanda Rose was working the booths, which meant I could forget about complimentary refills.
 
Delay had spared me the bulk of Harold's latest sermon on societal misguidance -- a blessing obviously envied by the other captives. Byron Fenderman's expression manifested a silent, as yet unanswered prayer -- most likely that Harold would be struck mute. Soon.
 
The as yet audible Harold was viewing with alarm a recent City Council ordinance which sought to protect consumers by exacting harsh penalties for the misrepresentation of goods and services, a measure Harold equated with restraint of trade.
 
It requires no special creative powers to imagine Harold deftly manipulating walnut shells.
 
"Damn chair polishers," He said, nervously batting the salt shaker like a tennis ball back and forth between his hands, "Got no more idea than the man in the moon what it takes to make a buck. 'Misrepresentation' my --," suddenly aware of Doreen,"-- Well, I mean, what's wrong with making people feel good about what they're buying?"
 
Doreen looked uncomfortable and started to say something but apparently thought better of it and sank back against the brown vinyl seat that perfectly matched her suit, rendering her nearly invisible in the waning blinds-filtered light.
 
When Froggy went a-courtin' I imagine his intended to have been quite a bit like Doreen.
 
"Well," said Byron, "I gotta go with the City on this one. You don't need to be sellin' stuff you gotta lie 'bout." Harold glared at Byron as though the Arkansas boy had brought corn liquor to church.
 
"I don't see it that way, By," said Shelley, who to my knowledge has never agreed with his brother about anything, "I mean, it's about the kinda' lyin' they're doin' ain't it? I mean there's lyin' and there's lyin, ain't there?'"
 
"Yeah, and they both the same," Byron said flatly. Shelley frowned, and looked down and fiddled with the pen in his work-shirt pocket. .
 
All discussions of moral deficiency must inevitably lead to the allied topic of politics. Gunter the Ex-European posed a question regarding the intersection of American politics and lying. Gunter has only been here a few years and is having difficulty making sense of the American political system. Just like the rest of us.
 
If "system" is the correct word.
 
"Here's all you need to know:" Harold pontificated, "Lying is essential to government; couldn't work without it --"
 
"Oh, now, don't tell him that --" began Doreen, sitting forward and brushing back a lock of brown hair.
 
Harold held out his palms, a restraining gesture somehow reinforced by the heavy gold cufflinks and watch. "No, no, really, it's indispensable -- look," he said, turning his hands as though to shape his argument, "imagine trying to tell everyone in the country the same thing at the same time. No way. Trust me on this: you want to make your point, you have to tailor it to your audience; play up what each one wants -- needs -- to hear, and leave out the rest." He looked solely at Doreen as he spoke.
 
"By which you mean lie to them," Doreen returned, light coming into her eyes at last.
 
"By which I mean tell them the truth they need," he said, his finger stabbing the table in front of her. For a moment Harold and Doreen were alone at the table.
 
"Hey!" said Byron, shattering the moment, "It don't matter what people want to hear or they don't, the truth's the truth."
 
"Nuh-uh" said Shelley, shaking his head exaggeratedly, "There's gotta be some things wouldn't do people no good to hear, 'cause they wouldn't be ready to."
 
"You got it, buddy!" Harold shouted. Doreen flinched, but did not drop her eyes. "Most people don't really want to hear the truth, mainly because it's almost always bad news, and a lot of trouble to figure out. Sometimes you're doing them a favor by lying to them."
 
"Oh, that's just nonsense," said Doreen definitively, "There's no such thing as a good lie."
 
"It's not always exactly a lie," said Harold, regarding Doreen narrowly "Sometimes it's just a little spin on the truth. And it's not always a bad thing, sometimes it's exactly what they need to hear" He pointed at Doreen, "Be honest, you ever object when a guy tells you you look great?"
 
From Doreen's expression, Harold might have just asked her to translate Homer. She was clearly having trouble connecting with his hypothesis. I imagined her frenziedly searching through her mental diary.
 
Harold continued, smiling, obviously aware of Doreen's impalement. "To tell you the truth, I wouldn't want a leader who couldn't lie. Look at Jimmy Carter. The minute he said 'I will never lie to you,' I said 'uh-oh, this guy doesn't have the faintest idea what being President is about."
 
"Why is that?" A puzzled Gunter.
 
"Because," said Harold, "The job requires you to lie -- sometimes to your friends, always to your enemies. The rules are different up there: half the time the truth is dangerous, the other half it's just irrelevant.
 
"And I'll tell you something else," he said, leaning more closely to the yet distracted Doreen, "A President who tells you he won't lie is the biggest liar of them all -- unless he actually believes what he's saying, in which case --"
 
"He's a fool and a liar," finished Gunter.
 
"Exactly," said Harold, proudly patting his percipient pupil's shoulder. "In fact, if you look at it in a certain way," he said, "The truth's only another kind of lie."
 
"What does that mean?" said Doreen, now returned from her impromptu trip down memory lane, and once again at fray.
 
"It's simple," he said , "The world's insane. Anybody who thinks different's just fooling himself -- or herself," he added, with greater gratuity than necessary. "The only way to make sense of it is to tell yourself stories about it, and then try like hell to remember the stories -- some of which we call 'truth,' and the rest we call 'lies.' But that's just bookkeeping, because either way it's all made up."
 
He leaned forward more closely to Doreen, nearly face to face with her. "You show me a President who understands that, and I'll show you a guy we can trust to get the job done." He sat back and smiled, confident of his point.
 
Doreen, eyes wide and feeling her forces slipping into disarray, "But -- but that doesn't make any sense!" she said, raising her hands above her head, How can you trust someone who always lies to you?"
 
Harold's smile broadened, "How can you trust anybody else?" he said, "A liar's the only one who loves the truth enough to invent his own."
 
Neither Doreen nor anyone else had a reply to that, and it seemed as good a time as any to leave.
 
As we walked out to the parking lot I asked Harold if he really thought truth was merely a form of lie.
 
"Maybe, maybe not," he said, winking and pretend-punching my shoulder, "You can't believe everything you hear."