Is G W Bush's foreign policy ethical or is it just murderous blather?

Don't get me wrong, I fully expect that for the sake of political survivial, some politicians will find it necessary to lie.

Richard Nixon stonewalled the Watergate inquiry until it became hopeless; Ronald Reagan ("I don't recall.") had no memory of the Iran Contra scandal; and Bill Clinton ("I did not have sexual relations with that woman.") just kept on lying until he was impeached.

Other times, politicians are indeed obliged to lie to us.

During World War II, for example, John Curtin never told the Australian people how bad things were in February 1942.

Franklin D. Roosevelt, for his part, kept on lying to the American people until the Japanese strike on Pearl Harbour finally got America into the war with Hitler.

In my own time, I can still remember Dwight Eisenhower telling us that there were no U2 flights over the Soviet Union until of course the Russians shot down Gary Powers and put him on trial.

I can also remember John F. Kennedy telling the world that he did not cut a secret deal (US missiles out of Turkey) with Moscow to get Soviet missiles out of Cuba.

These were state secrets at the time and therefore acceptable.

What is not acceptable is the murderous blather of politicians who put their own people in harm's way, for political ambitions.

This not only unethical but potentially dangerous.

Lyndon Johnson lies about the Vietnam War, America's longest war, resulted in an unmitigated disaster, costing tens of thousands of lives and billions of dollars.

It was a tragedy waiting to happen.