“statement of offenses”<\/a> that Thompson signed as part of his plea bargain.\u00a0 Gray deserves the presumption of innocence, and he most certainly will have a day in court.\u00a0 The only question is whether that will come before or after the next mayoral election.<\/p>\nI cannot comment on the mayoral campaign or candidates, nor can I comment on whether Mayor Gray will be indicted and convicted.\u00a0 All of that is up to the voters, the prosecutors, the legal process.<\/p>\n
What I can say is this:\u00a0 public officials have a large duty to be ethical role models, to avoid even the appearance of unethical or illegal activity.\u00a0 Sadly, too many public officials seem ignorant of these responsibilities.<\/p>\n
I’ve known Vincent Gray for a long time, long before he became a public official.\u00a0 Trinity students and alumnae going back across the years remember him for his leadership and advocacy on behalf of students with disabilities through his work with the DC ARC, Covenant House and other organizations.\u00a0 I was happy to work with him when he became D.C. Council Chair when he pursued legislative initiatives to expand Pre-K opportunities in D.C.\u00a0 I was delighted when he became mayor because of all that I knew about his long and strong devotion to improving the lives of D.C. citizens.\u00a0 As mayor he has championed scholarships for Trinity students and a broad range of economic development opportunities that benefit the citizens and institutions of D.C. \u00a0 I am disappointed that this great track record now suffers a serious and potentially devastating shadow of corruption and deceit.\u00a0 For the sake of the city and all who depend on its vitality, I hope the processes required to determine guilt or innocence will proceed quickly so that the city can keep moving forward.<\/p>\n
Beyond all of that, we also need to consider the sobering facts about the ethical challenges facing public officials not only here but in just about every location where politics and money play large roles in gaining and keeping power.\u00a0\u00a0 In all of the debates about educational reform today, there’s almost no discussion of education about ethical choices and the role of schools in building a culture of honor and integrity.\u00a0 So much emphasis is put on rote learning for standardized testing that there’s almost no place in the curriculum for the kind of deep and reflective development of mind and spirit that must occur for large ethical formation.<\/p>\n
Here at Trinity, we devote a good deal of time and effort to reinforcing the fundamental concepts of the Honor System.\u00a0 Every student takes the basic pledge to uphold the standards of honor against which lying, stealing and cheating are completely unacceptable.\u00a0 Yet, even here, with all the attention we pay to the ideals of honor and integrity, we often feel that we have not done enough, and we know we can always do more.<\/p>\n
The Original Sin was not really about eating the apple, but rather, lying about it.\u00a0 Oh, and blaming somebody else for the misdeed.\u00a0 The most fundamental ethical lesson we must reinforce at every level of education is the absolute need to take ownership of one’s own actions, to tell the truth and live with the consequences of the truth.\u00a0\u00a0 Imagine how much more effective political systems could be if elected officials could truly exemplify these fundamental lessons.<\/p>\n
It’s not that hard:\u00a0 the next time some creepy “Uncle Earl” fiction oozes into the conversation, just walk away.\u00a0 Fast.\u00a0 Run.\u00a0 Better to lose the election than lose your soul.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Public officials should not make up fictional characters to hide campaign activities. Duh.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,6,19,787],"tags":[1352,1349,1351,1350,1348,483],"class_list":["post-4421","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-honor-code","category-media","category-living","category-political-issues","tag-d-c-politics","tag-jeffrey-thompson","tag-political-scandal","tag-robert-mcdonnell","tag-uncle-earl","tag-vincent-gray"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4421","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4421"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4421\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4421"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4421"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4421"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}