The fiction we’ve become
By Andy Torbett
The ruling has come down on the Tom Brady suspension and, no surprise; the NFL is trying to save face by keeping the suspension in place. The so-called “save the integrity of the game” ruling is nothing more than a sham to cover the lack of integrity repeatedly exhibited by NFL commissioner Roger Goodell. Remember, this is the man who tried to let Ray Rice, running back for the Baltimore Ravens, off with a mere slap on the wrist for the crime of beating his pregnant fiancée senseless in plain sight of a video camera. Goodell changed his ruling to fit the crime only after a major outcry, starting with a scathing public renunciation from Governor Paul LePage, created a messy PR disaster for the Commissioner.
Ah yes, Roger Goodell, such a shining example of conviction for the youth of our Nation. For all his bluster about defending the integrity of the game, no one individual has done more to damage the integrity of the NFL than Roger Goodell. Still, he knows how to make a stand on air pressure, because we all know ball pressure is far more important that pregnant women…right?
And the Wells Report was so definitive about Brady’s ba….I mean, air pressure. Mr. Wells stated emphatically that he was pretty sure that probably Tom Brady maybe knew about the possibility that somebody somewhere was doing something that might be bad without any real proof of how the bad thing was done but everyone knows that Brady knows so we know that he most likely did something that we are not sure of… Doesn’t that just make you want to shout Truth, Justice, and the American Way? Really? Because I don’t!
But this is where we are as a society. We have become a people who would rather make decisions based upon what we want truth to be rather than discover what truth is. Brady’s…air pressure aside, the NFL is determined to destroy the legacy of the greatest quarterback who has ever played the game because he wins too much, plays for a coach who pushes the limits in all directions to find every edge to win, and they both don’t give a rat’s diseased riddled hindquarters what the NFL thinks of them.
Still, we love fiction over fact. For years we’ve exhorted children to believe in themselves. We’ve preached the virtues of being happy and validated in their own unique self. There’s no one like them … right?
Unless you are superstar Olympic athlete who’s decided he’s not happy with who he is and wants his he to be she or a white female whose not happy that she is white and wants to be black, now that’s courageous according to the new world view. Imagine all the children we’ve been teaching to “be happy with who they are” that must now face a new dilemma in their young minds, as if they needed a new dilemma, but here it is. Should I be happy with who I am or courageously unhappy with who I am? My, the contortions and convolutions we will go through as a nation not to face the truth.
Even our Supreme Court has contorted and twisted itself so that it might conjure a “right” that does not exist. In order to render a decision they deemed satisfactory to the gay community, the Justices of the Supreme Court have trampled State Sovereignty, Religious Liberty, and the Freedom of Speech, clearly defined in the Constitution, to create a “right” not clearly defined in the Constitution. If history is a lesson, those who make a decision based upon “Well everybody knows its true” more often than not end up in the category of “My God, what have we done?”
Andy Torbett of Atkinson writes a regular column called The Maine Conservative Voice. It appears regularly at this website http://meconservativevoice.com/about-mcv/