Bill Clinton, Gary Hart and failed U.S. Supreme Court nominee Douglas Ginsburg might jump at the prospect: a statute of limitations for moral transgressions.
It seems wacky but the idea has been profferred by George Washington University sociologist Amitai Etzioni in the January-February American Enterprise via the American Enterprise Institute.
”Under this new code,” he writes, ”moral transgressions that occurred more than, say, seven years ago would be considered off limits-inadmissible in confirmation hearings and unspoken on the campaign trail-on the grounds that it is unfair to hold against a person acts committed and owned up to that long ago.”
He notes that we have statutes of limitations for many crimes, so why not for moral indiscretions? Was it really fair that Ginsburg withdrew his nomination because of smoking marijuana in college and, later, as a Harvard professor?
Etzioni concedes that distinguishing among types of sins would be hard, not to mention figuring out who`d be the Grand Arbiter of No-Nos. But ”to be more forgiving, we must distinguish, as many religions do, between major and minor transgressions.”
Alluding to Sen. Edward Kennedy`s Chappaquidick debacle, he writes:
”Driving one`s car over the side of a bridge and not attempting to rescue a passenger may distress us to the point that 20 years will not suffice to forgive. But we need not be so strict for everything.”
Seeking a ”morally sensitive community,” Etzioni underrates our ability to judge absent a decree as to what`s on the moral docket.
I`m reminded of a between-periods interview with the now-retired hockey legend Gordie Howe. The announcer asked if Howe made a mental note of every opponent who took an illegal swipe at him. Howe, himself a dirty player, responded, ”I may not remember each one, but I don`t forget.”
Let people remember what they desire. Our judgment may be wrongheaded at times, especially when instant transmission of data both weighty and trivial leaves us befuddled. Perhaps Ginsburg would have been been a great justice. But, all in all, it was best that we knew of his long-ago tokes and decided their meaning for ourselves.
Quickly: In February Gentlemen`s Quarterly, Joseph Nocera details the
”eerily similar plot line” in two books on Hollywood flops: Lillian Ross`
classic ”Picture,” about 1951`s ”Red Badge of Courage,” and Julie Salamon`s new ”The Devil`s Candy,” on ”The Bonfire of the Vanities.”
… February Kiplinger`s Personal Finance, noting how ”developers are going broke in droves,” offers advice, including averting the possibility of a developer looting deposits on unfinished homes. … While admitting that executives may ”treat the corporate treasury like a private bank,” Feb. 10 Newsweek argues that their pay is shareholders`, not Congress`, business. … Bashing Omaha financial whiz Warren Buffett in Feb. 17 New Republic, sharp Michael (”Liar`s Poker”) Lewis strains a bit in deriding a ”cult of the investment genius” that creates unrealistic expectations and leads people to take crazy investment risks. … Marshall Frady`s Jesse Jackson profile continues in Feb. 10 New Yorker, with insights into how Jackson made Martin Luther King`s apostolic social vision his own. … Charles de Gaulle may have saved France`s honor but, according to a wonderful Israel Shenker profile in February Smithsonian, Victor Renaud has saved her vegetables. France`s most famous gardener tries to ”rescue from oblivion the drumhead cabbage, the burnet pimpernel, the violin gourd, the hypochondriac amaranth and the bean dignified as the `nun`s navel.”` And he grows 190 varieties of tomato. … In Feb. 10 Nation, Alexander Cockburn, tracking New Hampshirites` positive response to Bill Clinton`s bashing of the media, writes, ”People will always cheer someone stomping the gutter press for unwarranted intrusion, even if it`s the Marquis de Sade, a protective arm wrapped around Justine, beefing about the slanders and low talk put about by his enemies.” . . . January`s 20th anniversary issue of London-based Index on Censorship, a highly informative, if infuriating, catalog of repression worldwide, recounts how newly opened files of the East German secret police give insights into how writers and publishers helped censor themselves ($39 for 10 issues yearly, U.S. checks are fine, to Writers & Scholars International Ltd., 39c Highbury Place, London N5 1QP).
