In the early seventies John Diefenbaker ,Canada's

13th PM accused the Liberal Front Benches of Machiavellian

Causitry. This sent members of the Press Corps scampering

for their lexicons..sent me also but mine was archaic and

word causitry was missing . Never really got the full

import of the phrase and good old John passed away in 79.

Give the Carambola some imput .

a quick search of OneLook gave me this:

(in other words, it looks to have been a typo, or he mis-spoke...)


Quick definitions (Casuistry)

# noun: moral philosophy based on the application of general ethical principles to resolve moral dilemmas
# noun: argumentation that is specious or excessively subtle and intended to be misleading

Encyclopedia article

Casuistry is any attempt to determine the correct response to a moral problem, often a moral dilemma, by drawing conclusions based on parallels with agreed responses to pure cases, also called paradigms. Another common everyday meaning is "complex reasoning to justify moral laxity."

"complex reasoning to justify moral laxity."

Yeah, there's a lot of that goin' around.

Machiavellian casuistry would be the art of using lies
skillfully to achieve political goals.

>Machiavellian casuistry would be the art of using lies
skillfully to achieve political goals.

Or, more precisely, it would include doing so, since there is nothing in the term that rules out using it to describe casuistry employed to achieve goals other than political ones.

"complex reasoning to justify moral laxity."

Yeah, there's a lot of that goin' around.

... and a lot of moral reasoning to justify simpletons.

I don't believe that good ol' Niccolo ever said you have to lie. He only suggested that it was a perfectly valid thing to do ...

and besides, it was doubtless actually said by his press spokeman "in an off-the-record briefing"...