I am an optimist.
I believe in the fairness and goodness of people.
Even when I am given evidence that a person's motives are narcissistic, I fall into a pattern of believing the best of intentions.
I would like to believe that I am right and circumstance sometimes makes people less than aware of the impact of their choices.
In hopes that perhaps I can raise that awareness an incremental amount, I would like to address the specific issue related to being the object of a government investigation.
I have been a Washingtonian and continue to live near my favorite city.
I love our capital.
It is a city which can eat its young, however.
Anyone who lives and works in Washington, D.
C.
can tell you amazing stories of the rise and fall of individuals that would make many people choose to stay away.
I would like to state that I think the role our government plays in watching over our interests to be sure that people do not take advantage of the system for their own gain is an important role.
I believe in our government's inherent goodness, as I do in the goodness of the individual.
I believe sometimes however that people, in their enthusiasm for the job of stewardship, are oblivious or perhaps unconcerned for the potential fall out to the subject of an investigation, should they be wrong.
I am personally sensitive to the concept of "innocent until proven guilty" as a fundamental principle for our legal system.
I have found that reality does not always match our idealistic understanding of that concept.
In the city of DC, if you are being investigated for any reason (even that of a remote connection to someone else who is being investigated), the city tends to close ranks and isolate anyone on whom our investigators focus their attention.
Let me concentrate for a moment on our watchdogs.
They are dedicated, and values driven people who have spent their lives looking for abusers of one of the best systems in existence.
They are often the only thing standing between the abusers and the rest of us.
My one concern is that often, in the aftermath of a long and intense investigation, they neglect to clarify their results.
If someone has been found innocent of their concerns, that person is left to pick up the pieces with little or no support from the government that had them under the spotlight.
The person's life may have been completely disrupted during the process with a loss of business and friends, and yet no one seems to be accountable for setting the record straight.
I have personally witnessed the shattering lives of good people due to an investigation that ultimately bore no fruit.
What of them? Are they guilty by the association to an investigation? Is that fair or just? Is our government as diligent in protecting them during the process as they are of the system.
I would also like to suggest that the rest of us, who so enjoy a good story, be very careful about how we form our opinions and how we respond to a person who might be the subject of the media (good or bad).
We tend to believe what we hear and read, with perhaps too little attention to the facts.
We too are responsible for enabling the destruction of good people.
My purpose is this.
I would like to see those that protect us be ever thoughtful of their power and the consequences of their choices.
I would also like us all to be careful about condemning others simply because they are a "person of interest".