Stop Picking Teams and Start Picking Truth: The Courage Nobody in Washington Has

Your Team Is Not Always Right. Neither Is Mine.

Let me say something that apparently qualifies as radical these days. Both sides do it. Both sides have politicians who behave badly. Both sides have media figures who cover for them. And the endless whataboutism from every direction is making this country stupider and more corrupt by the day.

I was listening to a homily recently that made a point so simple it should be obvious but somehow isn’t anymore. Two things can be true at the same time. The founders built something extraordinary. They also owned slaves. Both true. Hold both. The inability to do that is not a political disagreement. It’s a failure of basic intellectual honesty.

The Seven Cowards of 1896

Let’s talk about Plessy v. Ferguson. 1896. Seven Supreme Court justices voted to uphold “separate but equal.” One man, John Marshall Harlan, dissented. One.

Here’s what I want you to understand about those seven. They weren’t ignorant. They weren’t confused. They knew exactly what they were doing. They chose the expedient path over the right one. They did what was politically manageable in the moment, and the result was nearly sixty years of institutionalized injustice until Brown v. Board of Education finally corrected it in 1954.

Sixty years of damage because seven men didn’t have the guts to do what one man did.

• Expedience is almost always the wrong choice when it conflicts with what’s right
• The shortcut has a way of becoming the longest and most destructive road
• Moral courage is rare, and institutions punish it, which is exactly why it matters
• One dissenting voice matters more than seven cowardly ones

The Modern Version Is Happening Right Now

I watch political commentators on television every single day performing the same act those seven justices performed. They see clearly that their politician did something wrong. They know it. And they spin anyway. They deflect anyway. They play the whataboutism game anyway because the alternative is admitting their team isn’t perfect.

That’s not analysis. That’s not journalism. That’s not advocacy. That’s cowardice dressed up in a studio with good lighting.

Hans Christian Andersen’s Emperor Has No Clothes exists as a story because this is a human problem, not a new one. The entire court saw the emperor was naked. Every adult stayed silent. It took a child with nothing to lose to say the obvious out loud.

We need more people willing to be that kid.

What This Has to Do With Everything Else

I’ve spent my career watching this exact dynamic destroy people’s finances on Wall Street. Advisors who knew a product was toxic but sold it anyway because their firm expected it. Analysts who stamped “buy” on garbage because the investment banking fees depended on it. The institutional pressure to go along is enormous in finance, in politics, in media, everywhere.

The people who get hurt are always the ones who trusted the institution.

• Stop outsourcing your judgment to a political party
• Stop letting team loyalty override your ability to identify obvious wrongdoing
• Demand that commentators and politicians you support be held to the same standard as those you oppose
• Recognize the expedient answer and the right answer are almost never the same

This is not left versus right. It is right versus wrong. And if you can’t tell the difference anymore because your jersey is in the way, that’s the real problem we need to fix.