How To Be Evasive And Noncommittal: Read Their Lips (If You Can)

In today's column, we will learn from elected officials who've spent their adult years in the public eye, dealing with tough questions. All quotes are real.

Example 1: At the corporate seminar on diversity training, you are the management representative. An employee asks a question you consider particularly counterproductive, such as why there haven't been any raises in five years.

Suggested answer: "Would you please shut up and sit down?"

Example 2: You are making an important presentation to a group of high-powered businessmen. They grill you on complicated matters about which you should, but don't, have a clue.

Suggested answer: "We are ready for any unforeseen event that may or may not occur."

Second suggested answer: "If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure."

Third suggested answer: "We will move forward, we will move upward, and, yes, we will move onward."

How do these elected officials handle embarrassing questions? Is there one technique favored?

Example 3: You are running for PTA president on a platform of providing a personal computer for every student to prepare them for the modern world. You are asked about a conflict of interest, since you're a computer salesman.

Suggested answer: "I've said more than any other candidate for president . . . I have told you all I think you are entitled to know."

Second suggested answer: "It isn't about me. It's about you and your problems and your promise and your future."

Third suggested answer: "You need to believe again that we can make a difference. The beginning of everything is believing that we can do better. Thank you very much."

In this election year, the spotlight is on the candidates for president and vice president. These are politicians seeking the most powerful job in the world, or to be a heartbeat away from it. Surely, there is much they can teach us about dealing with the tribulations of life.

Example 4: The IRS has called you in for an audit and you are being grilled about those deductions you took, such as deducting your kids' weekly allowances as a business expense. The IRS agent wants some explanations. Now.

Suggested answer: "If you want to have a philosophical discussion, I take your point, because I think it is important that if we - if you presented me with a hypothesis, `You've got to do this or you've got to do that,' and I would accept it and understand the political risks that'd be involved if I showed any flexibility at all in even discussing it - I would have to say that - that a - that you make a very valid point with your question, because, as I tried to indicate in my remarks, it's job creation, and that is attraction of capital that is really the best antidote to poverty."

Second suggested answer: "I know what I've told you I'm going to say, I'm going to say. And what else I say, well, I'll take some time to figure out - figure that all out."

Third suggested answer: "So don't feel sorry for - don't cry for me, Argentina."

These politicians have learned how to use "personal" touches so skeptical audiences can "relate."

Example 5: The IRS has called you back again, with more questions about your tax return. What emotional buttons to push to get some sympathy?

Suggested answer: "I never met my father. He was killed in a car wreck on a rainy road three months before I was born. . . ."

Second suggested answer: "I was shot down, and I was floating around in a little yellow raft, setting a record for paddling. I thought of my family, my mom and dad, and the strength I got from them. I thought of my faith, the separation of church and state."

We hope today's lesson helped. And now. . . .

"What time is it?"

(Example 1, quote from George Bush. Example 2, all quotes from Dan Quayle. Example 3, all quotes from Bill Clinton. Example 4, all quotes from George Bush. Example 5, first quote from Bill Clinton, second from George Bush. The final, lone quote is from Al Gore, who, being the newest face in this presidential race, doesn't yet register many blips on the library computer search. But remember that there are 100 days left before the election. And that the computers never, never rest.)

Erik Lacitis' column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Friday in the Scene section of The Times.