Two events happened recently that made me think about what we could be.
One event involved a golfer who was an entrant in one of the tournaments that are held to determine who qualifies to play in the US Open. He played great. How great? Well, the guy set the course record. He was thrilled. His dream of playing in one of the four Major golf tournaments in the world was about to come true.
The greens on the course had been aerated. There remained in them some of the slight aeration bump holes that are created from that process . As the golfer was reveling in his wonderful day, he overheard some other golfers moaning about how difficult it had been to putt when one of those holes was in their line. The golfer suddenly realized that on one of his putts, one of those bumps had been in his line and that before he had putted, he had patted it down. Under the rules of golf, that’s a no-no. You can’t improve your lie that way. It’s a two-stroke penalty. He’d done it without thinking and certainly without any intent to cheat. No one else knew that he had done it. But, when golf is played honestly, that doesn’t matter. The golfer realized that he had signed and handed in an inaccurate scorecard. Once signed and submitted, it couldn’t be changed. He had done something wrong. He reported himself to the officials. He was disqualified. His dream, at least for now, dashed. In his world, what he did was considered entirely correct and expected.
The other event was the CNN interview with Orange Julius. The contradistinction between his conduct on that evening and the golfer’s conduct at the tournament are, as Tommy Jefferson liked to say, “self-evident.” In that interview, the Orangetang could hardly have defied the very concept of integrity more often and more patently. There is the old joke about how you know a lawyer is lying – his lips are moving. Orangetang lied on CNN even when his lips weren’t moving. He did it with his bloated body – waving to encourage the crowd’s appreciation of his lies, and sneering at Kaitlin Collins, the excellent moderator, when she frequently and accurately tried to correct him. His lies were so many and so outrageous that no one could have straightened him out. Yet, in his world, this was considered entirely correct and expected.
This is the contradistinction between what we could be and what we are. We could be the golfer. We could be the ones who expect integrity both in ourselves and in others. Or we could be the Trumpers. We could be the ones who expect people to just get away with what they can and laugh at those stupid enough to actually follow the rules.
It’s our choice.
We were right 