GRE® Essay: Complete honesty is not a useful virtue for a politician

[Konstantin]

Hello!
What do you think about the phrase [ you know ]? I think it's OK, you know. :idea:

Question:
It is impossible for an effective political leader to tell the truth all the time. Complete honesty is not a useful virtue for a politician.

Answer:
It’s possible to consider the truth as a universal virtue, but it’s quite hard for a successful politician not to lie all along. Complete honesty could cut the career for beginning politician and could undermine positions of politics titans. Also, there are some cases when telling nothing or even lying is much more effective not merely for a politician himself, but for others.

A beginner politician would be rejected soon from the political arena, if he didn’t make his best efforts. He has to be energetic, confident and possesses a good reputation. Unfortunately, there are some reasons that don’t depend on the person and his present behavior: at first he is able to have inappropriate parents; secondly he may have been accused in some offence at youth age etc. All these reasons cause people to lie, counterfeit documents in order to receive a piece of power. For example, in the Soviet Union it would have been impossible to receive a significant administrative position if you have had wealthy bourgeois or merchants as the ancestors. So, everyone who wanted to be a political figure had to lie about “dark sides” of his life.

Some politicians slander and defame at all times, trying to earn more money or become more powerful. This approach is totally disruptive and such liars often end their lives in a prison.
At the same time, there were a lot of particular situations in the history of humankind, demanding a white lie for the entire nations’ surviving. During the beginning of the Second World War, when the Nazi Army inflicted heavy casualties on the Russian people, it was essential for the Soviet government to misrepresent the situation, maintaining the high spirit among military men and citizenry. Daily reports told about victories and small losses even in the opposite situation; as the result all these efforts had helped to keep Moscow in 1941 and prevented a further invasion.

Everybody knows a principle that people will never trust a man who lied only one time and this lie was revealed. At the same time a person who brings bad news often becomes an object of acerbic gossips. Therefore, it’s important for a politician to keep silent in some cases. At first bad news should be made public by some minor clerk in the government or by press and only after that a political leader has to represent his position. Nevertheless, such behavior is ambiguous because voters may think about the politician’s cowardice; that’s why only great politicians are able to maintain the balance among truth, lie and silence.

As for me, I believe that people have to be honest, but it’s not so useful for politicians. Certainly, they are able to improve their social status using falsehood, but, simultaneously, the truth may be too darn for commoners.