This is a story about the limits of logic.
And, it is a story about an old pal of mine.
Good guy. Did all the right things,
did them well, and worked his way up.
Nice life, a poster boy for the American Dream.
And I've got to get this off my chest tonight.
One morning, it dawned on him things weren’t all right with a business deal.
Dug into it, found his partners were stealing from the investors.
Bad news. He was sharing in the proceeds,
and he was sharing the responsibility.
He went to the authorities, and brought the whole thing down.
He went to prison, lost everything,
and will work the rest of his life to repay the victims.
All because he saw that he was responsible for what happened.
He told me he pulled the plug because every day it ran on,
the victims were going to suffer more. He couldn’t undo it.
He could only resolve it as quickly as possible.
His choice was not made by logic,
but by an old Marine tattoo on his arm. You know the one, right ?
Now, Logic is only a meat grinder.
It chews up whatever is put into it's hopper when the crank is turned.
And today, we are a very logical nation. We uphold Reason,
and demand rationality at every turn. But Rationality is incomplete,
and if we look to Rationality when we hunger for truth and meaning,
we are like the starving man cranking away on an empty meat grinder.
What we put into the hopper is the Premise of the argument.
The premise is the foundation of Logic,
and in the case of human behaviour the premise is Morality.
Our President is probably a very Rational man. He was elected by people who see themselves as exemplars of the Virtues, and their hard-headed Logic. Steady eyes, decisive, and resolute; the epitome of conservative western american virtues.
So, I’m thinking of my old pal today. He worked pretty hard today,
and if I know him, wept before going to bed for making his mistakes.
But he’ll sleep well for facing up to his duty, and having done what was right.
A moral man, he lost all that we value today. Most folks would think he was silly. He probably could have gotten away scot free.
But, like that tattoo said, "Death before..." Well, you know how it goes.
Now I hope Scooter can sleep tonight. And I hope The President has a good Fourth of July. Rational, and steady eyed, I hope he smiles at the fireworks.
But I wish my moral and honorable old ex-con buddy were running this country right now. And I pray there can be found some honorable folks in Congress. The time for Rationality has passed, the time for Politics is over. All that is left is Duty, and Honor, and Morality. It IS time to do the Right Thing.
Happy Fourth. Stand tall.