Recently, I wrote that my fly-fishing gear was stolen. I managed to find some humor in it later, but at the time, it was no laughing matter. When I reported this theft to the police, a City Police Officer arrived to write the report. As the young man took my report, he asked detailed questions and sympathized greatly. Within the detail of his questions, I realized that he was a fly-fisherman too. He understood the considerable personal value as well as the monetary value of a man’s fishing gear. After he completed the report, we discussed fly-fishing methods, equipment, and even traded secrets of our favorite streams and flies. We agreed that it took a sub-human form of life, a product of the shallow end of the gene pool, to steal another man’s fishing gear.

As we talked, I found the young Policeman was also a catch-and-release trout fisherman. This told me a great deal more about him as a person. He enjoyed fishing as a pure and true sport. He didn’t intend to keep and eat the fish. He took to the streams for the sheer sport of catching the ever-elusive mountain trout. The policeman was a conservationist. As he released his catch, he felt not only the considerable satisfaction that he had experienced the sportsman’s thrill in the taking of his prey, but also enjoyed the moral satisfaction of releasing the game into the wild to continue nature’s cycle.

In the young policeman, I saw a responsible, caring, and ambitious young adult of high moral fiber. He held a great deal of respect for the world, the environment, the people, and the small North Carolina town that he was sworn to protect.

The young City Cop’s name was Nate Wilson. Officers Nate Wilson and Mike Sutton were ambushed in the early morning hours of Saturday, August 17 of this year. The shotgun attack took place in the Freedman community of Lenoir. The Freedman community is an area that City Police, City Officials, and local residents have made little headway in their efforts to curb the flow of drugs and the amount of violent crime since a 1990 riot in the community that resulted in the arrest of thirteen people.

For two fine men like Mike Sutton and Nate Wilson to have been ambushed while attempting to protect the local residents, illustrates an alarming lack of regard for the law, for the people that enforce the law, and an utter disregard for what is right and what is wrong. Sadly, even in a small North Carolina town, it is quickly becoming less of an isolated event than a disturbing trend. It is a trend that illustrates more of a breakdown of morality and less of a common thread of respect and human decency that makes up society’s collective moral fiber. This awful trend is showing up in the most disturbing places as a ‘new morality.’

The ‘new morality’ that allowed a crack-head to gun down two police officers is the same ‘new morality’ that tells a High School student it’s OK to bring a gun to school to protect himself. It is the same ‘new morality’ that puts blinders on a corporate executive when decisions are made regarding profitability and personnel when the only true profit is in his personal gain. This is precisely why "For the good of the people that make this company what it is today" will not appear in today’s company mission statement. It is why "Do the right thing" will not be found in today’s corporate by-laws.

It is the same ‘new morality’ that puts blinders on so many people when they look at a politician’s track record. It is this ‘new morality’ that encourages politicians to pursue, and for us to endure, the viscous negative campaigning that should, by all rights, turn us totally against them all. It is no wonder so many people are turned off by election-year politics and rhetoric. It is this ‘new morality’ that makes it so easy to ignore our President’s history of questionable business dealings as those in his past are sent to jail. And as his top advisor is exposed to have been shacked up with a two hundred dollar hooker in a six hundred dollar suite, (all at the tax-payers expense) we are reminded that lawsuits regarding his own questionable sexual conduct have been conveniently put on hold until after the election. And let’s not forget that although he opposed the violence in Vietnam, he didn’t hesitate to launch 27 million dollars worth of Cruise missiles into Iraq in a campaign year.

When was the last time you heard a politician say "I will do the right thing." You never have, and you never will because, today, no-one can agree on what "the right thing" is. Sadly, it’s as much our fault because we let it continue. We no longer demand that our representatives be of high moral fiber. We must demand this change.

We won’t see Nate Wilson’s name was on this November’s Ballot. But we should. He’s not confused about what "The right thing" is.

By the grace of God, (and bullet-proof vests) the lives of both officers were spared that August morning. The crack-head that attempted to murder Officers Wilson and Sutton was found passed-out in his car the next day and was arrested.

Rob Wedding © 1996