“Blink” and Bill

A few months ago, I read a best seller called, “Blink.” One of the things I found most intriguing about “Blink” was a study that had been done by university professors where they would observe a short interaction between couples. For instance, a husband and wife would be observed while they chatted over some “issue” in their marriage; something as trivial as doing the dishes. What the scientists discovered was that by counting the involuntary movements of each person, they could rank that person’s true feelings. Say, a certain number of rolls of the eyes showed contempt, a certain number of glances away from their partner indicated shame, etc. After only a few minutes of interaction, scientists could predict, with something like 85% accuracy, if the couple would stay married more than a few years.
After reading this book, my interest in human interaction and involuntary “signs” was sparked even more. Last night on The O’Reilly Factor, Bill had a guest on who is an expert in body language. She observed some interactions between Dick Cheney and Chris Wallace, Condi Rice, and even a speech made at the Golden Globes by Warren Beatty. After observing the briefest of clips, the expert could determine whether or not each person was lying, what their motivation was in answering each question, etc.
Folks, I don’t know about you, but I’d sure like to know wwhen politicians are lying to me. This is the cclosest thing we’ve got to hooking politicians up to a polygraph. It’s been a few months since I’ve watched an entire episode of The O’Reilly Factor, but apparently this is a regular segment-and one I plan on watching again. I hope you will, too…after all, we all benefit by keeping our politicians accountable.