strain the truth

I wondered how far Poirot had strained the truth in talking to Caroline - probably not at all.

"He strained the truth," said the man behind the desk, smiling so slightly that he actually looked pained.

When Bush and his loquacious frontman, Tony Blair, made the case for the war, they repeatedly strained the truth, and sometimes lied outright.

JUDGE: Let tortures strain the truth till it be white As snow thrice sifted by the frozen wind.

I was on the same scent myself, of course - ' I felt instinctively that Japp was straining the truth here - 'but there, I promised to let him play the thing out his own way.

Professor Higgs's rivals and enemies, of whom either the brilliancy of his achievements or his somewhat abrupt and pointed methods of controversy seem to have made him a great many, have risen up, or rather seated themselves, and written him down--well, an individual who strains the truth.