I understand that it's common for a politician to commit to some action during his campaign, and for it not to happen when he's later elected. To that extent, I

I understand that it's common for a politician to commit to some action during his campaign, and for it not to happen when he's later elected. To that extent, I agree that it's common for politicians to be liars. But I tend to think that it's not so much that they were planning to con everyone all along, but rather that they tried to push their ideas and failed to convince the rest of the legislature to go along with it. Maybe it died out because nobody cared about it in that year's Congress, and then the politician gets busy with other things while another year passes until the next legislature. I imagine it's the same mechanism at work in large companies: Haven't you ever had a new manager come on board, go gung-ho on changing a couple widely visible organizational thing and getting everyone's feedback, and then calm down a year or two later once they're busy with their work? I've probably seen that at least 5 times. However, there's a key difference: In the above situation, I would expect a politician to keep to the same general platform even if he fails to perform some specific action. The simpler statement 'all politicians are liars' leaves open the possibility that he might completely change his platform and starts actively pushing for things that he never mentioned. I don't know that I actually believe that about all or most politicians.