Free societies run on trust. People count on elections to be fair, the news to be honest and stock market representations to be true reflections of the cost/earnings ratios. These expectations are fundamentally different in authoritarian states where elections are staged, the press managed and markets often manipulated by family oligarchies. In a free society when any of these basic elements is gamed by people in power, the fabric of democracy is damaged.

Sadly, in the past few years, the United States' culture of trust has suffered an unusual number of insults. Our country's president was sworn into office under a Supreme Court order that directed a contested vote recount to be halted. Who can you trust if you can't trust our electoral system or highest court?

Recently, a New York Times reporter fabricated stories and made up quotes from people he failed to interview. Who can you trust if you can't trust the nation's most respected newspaper?

President Bill Clinton claimed he "never had sexual relations with that woman," but reasonable people concluded the President lied. Who can you trust if you can't trust the President?

Catholic Bishops promised to keep children safe from priests who were known pedophiles, but on many occasions they broke this promise. Who can you trust if you can't trust the Church?

Enron, Arthur Anderson, Merrill Lynch and, closer to home, CMS Energy, all lied to their investors, employees and government regulators. Who can you trust if you can't trust your broker, accountant or friendly power company?

In each of these cases, people in authority lied, misled or manipulated the system to protect personal interests. Unfortunately, these blockbuster cases reveal only a piece of the pattern. A number of current congressional debates and presidential policies are equally untruthful.

Candidate Bush ran for office saying he would model himself after America's greatest conservation president, Theodore Roosevelt, but his conservation policies have been the absolute worst in more than a half century.

Unlike Newt Gingrich's overt attacks on the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts, the Bush Administration-well, to tell the truth-lies. For instance, while claiming his Clear Skies Act would better protect the environment, no unbiased, knowledgeable person could read the proposed act and reach that conclusion. The bill creates new loopholes that will allow power plants to emit annually thousands more tons of air pollution in future years than existing law would allow. It breaks the link between the Clean Air Act and health-based pollution standards, and it would allow poisonous mercury emissions from power plants to continue until years after the current law would have forced substantial reductions.

When business leaders lie, it saps confidence in our economy. When moral leaders lie, it corrodes trust in authority. When government leaders lie, it weakens democracy. When free people learn their government is lying, they either get outraged or cynical. For democracy's sake, I hope that when Americans exercise their right to vote, America's public outrage will trump her growing cynicism.