Grandma Said

When I was very little boy, my maternal grandmother warned me that, “Murder will out.” I didn’t understand her at the time.

When I was in the second grade, our teacher left the room, and I led a relatively harmless insurrection. We drew graffiti on the blackboards and stomped all about. It was really fun; about thirty little boys and girls having a ball. I felt great; my leadership had made it all happen.

After about five minutes, we heard Miss Dighton returning and flew to our seats; so much for that escapade.

Not so fast! While I know that thoughts of bamboo shoots being shoved under the finger nails of my classmates were what caused the calamity, it took only one question from authority to discover the culprit. “Who started this?”

That twenty-nine fingers could point so rapidly and accurately was beyond my comprehension and a beautiful circle of guilt centered on the felon. It took less than ten seconds for me to be identified, arrested, and convicted.

I drew one lesson from that fiasco that has never left me: never conspire to do anything even vaguely criminal. If I ever thought about committing felonies after that day – and I have never been convicted of any such activities – I assure you those thoughts never included partners in crime.

That’s what I learned in the second grade and when I finally understood Grandma’s warning.

When The Pentagon Papers were released and the darkest secrets of Vietnam were made public, I made a quick connection of the dots back to my second grade experience. Obviously, after the insider revelations about Tyco and Enron, it was clear that such dots were not limited to the public sector. Conspiring to suppress what bad or questionable things you might be doing isn’t smart.

Unfortunately for our president and quite a few others on his team, they led far too sheltered lives and never listened to their Grandmas or paid attention to what happened in virtually every elementary school in the history of our species. Murder will out and don’t conspire. Is there more basic advice than that?

When they played games with the NSA, it was only a matter of time before someone outed them.

I think what they did was stupid and that those big boys and girls are going to find that out. I was seven years old. They’re all over fifty. Slow Learners, I’d say.

Blog on!

Wild Bill