The experts who study this sort of thing say the average American lies 11 times a week. Some of those are little white lies—”this is delicious, honey,” or “only that one time in college.” Others are a bit greyer—”I’ve got the cash, promise,” “honestly, this has never happened to me before,” or “my intentions with your daughter are completely honorable, sir.” And other lies are blacker still—”there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction,” or “I did not have sexual relations with that woman.”
Most daily lies are private fibs, person to person, to which social consequence may attach but the government plays no role. But occasionally, lying creates problems with the state. You can’t falsely yell “bomb” on a crowded plane any more than you can yell “gun” in a crowded movie theater, and if you creatively revise your quarterly corporate earnings statement before release, an indictment may follow. Likewise, common law and statutory civil remedies have long existed for defamation, false advertising, perjury and other nonfactual speech alleged to cause harm.
