Let’s Get Real
JACK
There are many, many issues today, but to me the major problem in our society can be summed up in one word: hypocrisy. We suffer from rampant hypocrisy. I really don’t care if about to be former Senator. Larry Craig is gay or not. But, the hypocrisy is there. How can you plead guilty to the charge, and then several months later reverse it to not guilty? I think he should say not guilty by reason of hypocrisy. The sexual orientation issue has been widely used by the religious right and so many of the same people are, in reality, the reverse of what they preach.
HILLARY
Yeah — the old glass house problem. And, not to mix too many metaphors or quotations, it seems "the lady doth protest too much." Gotta wonder when someone is so vehemently opposed to homosexuals in society if they are, themselves, insecure with their own sexuality? I’m not going to condemn Larry Craig ‘ to be honest, it does sound like some kind of entrapment, and furthermore, doesn’t this country have more important things to talk about? - But it does highlight the issue of hypocrisy in politics. It seems that those, on both sides, who spend so much time talking about the denigration of the American family are the ones who themselves are degenerates.
JACK
I got a real charge out of your discourse with Curious George, and the comments on our last blog. Although you disagree with him, you exercised the proper democratic respect ‘ and I mean in the spirit of democracy, not the Democratic Party. I don’t know what party Voltaire would belong to, but he said, "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." History tells us that the greatest punishment comes from lying. It forced Nixon to resign, and sent Martha Stewart to jail. On a broader scale, all these bills passed by Congress, with extraordinary expenses (known as ‘pork’) just goes on and on. I fear that the reason they don’t blow the whistle is that there are so many culprits. Whether it’s business or politics, honest disagreement is healthy — hypocrisy never is.
HILLARY
So then why is it so rampant?
JACK
Perhaps I could explain it better if I were a psychiatrist. Seemingly intelligent people embark on dishonest schemes, like the Ponzi scheme — which is having people invest in a business that probably doesn’t exist, and they get paid from the last monies that get invested. When the thief runs out of investors the lid blows off the pot — The ingenuity with which these schemes are created belies a basic stupidity, which says that, by its very nature, you must get caught. Usually the thief has spent huge sums of money, and the investor never had a chance.
HILLARY
Are you comparing thievery to hypocrisy?
JACK
Absolutely. The latest example was huge contributions to leading Democrats, and the Democratic Party, by a businessman named Hsu. He became the darling of the Democrats, until it was discovered that his fortune was accumulated on the basis of a Ponzi scheme.
HILLARY
Is there any way for us as citizens, and basically as human beings, to avoid being hoodwinked and shaken down for, if nothing else, our faith?
JACK
The element that makes the perpetrator successful is greed. I would think that when large sums of money are contributed, someone should be checking on the legitimacy of the contributor. But I get back to my original statement — we have become too tolerant of hypocrisy. Larry Craig, as Ted Haggard, has stated a renewed faith. And in Haggard’s case a true confession. I can be tolerant of the weakness, but deplore the hypocrisy.
HILLARY
It seems to me that the fear of exposure and the self-loathing, for feelings that, to me, don’t seem unnatural, is the root of these particular cases of hypocrisy. If we lived in a society where homosexuality was truly acceptable, would these men have avoided the kind of scrutiny that they face?
JACK
To me, the issue is not homosexuality. In the politician and the minister’s case, they spend their lives preaching against the very same deed of which they are guilty. It is pervasive. I have been in board meetings where a subject or a commitment was being considered. I remember my uninitiated statement that it was the wrong thing to do. The response was, "sure, but it’s legal." The guy who made the statement was absolutely the picture of propriety to the outside world. The dominant idea is, ‘it’s ok to do it just don’t get caught.
HILLARY
This seems to be a commentary on morality, over which absolutists and relativists have been battling for millennia. At the end of the day, perhaps society would be better off not agreeing on what is or is not moral, rather than trying to make everyone agree — and driving underground those that cannot adhere to the "standard".
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