I got a letter from Ollie North the other day. He wanted my advice on a few things. Seems he is considering forming a new red, white and blue lobbying group to stand up for all the good and decent things, and he wanted to know what I thought of the idea. And oh, by the way, could I send a little something along the lines of cash to help purchase the red, white and blue paint he would need to cover the earth in its proper hues.

Now that's a novel idea, I thought, charging the advisor for the privilege of giving his advice. But then Ollie North doesn't seem to bother much with little details like that, he has big and noble intentions to do good, so what do details matter.

Hey, so I lied to Congress, so what. It was all in a good cause, and Congress can't be trusted to keep a secret anyway. And so what if we gave a Bible and a birthday cake and a couple of plane loads of Hawk missiles to the Ayatollah Khomeini. So what if we ripped-off the old Ayatollah and made a few bucks on the deal, that's the American way man. And so what if I gave the money to the Nicaraguan Contras, with a little cut for my buddies Secord and Hakim. Hey, we were fighting communism man. Indeed, fighting communism, surely that must be a noble intention if ever there was one. Hey, so I accepted a few little illegal gratuities along the way. Listen, man, I was protecting my family. Indeed, what could be more noble than that.

Ah, the cloak of noble intentions. How warm its weave and how fine its fabric.

The ancient Roman historian Plutarch once observed that little boys throw stones at frogs in sport, but the frogs die not in sport, but in earnest. His point of course was that our actions have consequences, and these consequences join imperfectly to our intentions.

It is not, therefore, sufficient justification of our actions to appeal to the nobility of our intentions. To act morally we must take responsibility for the effects we produce in the world--even if these effects are not what we intended. We are obliged, as moral agents, to take conscious, deliberate care to see that the consequences we unleash on the world are those we envisioned. And we must choose skillful means to ensure that this will be the case. A moral act is a composite whole, a sandwich of intentions and methods and consequences.

Of course there are slips twixt cup and lip, and we ought not scourge ourselves for these. There are plenty of other forces at work, and our influence is sadly short of omnipotent. So we cannot claim responsibility (or credit) for all the consequences of all our actions. But we are responsible to frame noble intentions, engage skillful means, and work toward wholesome consequences.

Just as intentions do not a good deed make, so too, consequences do not justify methods. It won't do to somehow arrive at positive outcomes if you violate the social fabric with your means or pollute the ethers with your intentions. And neither consequences nor methods suffice to cover unwholesome intentions. Its all of a piece--a unified field.

So, Ollie North, you asked for my advice. Here goes.

It might not be such a good idea to paint the whole world red, white and blue. Even if red, white and blue is for us just a shorthand code for all the noble aspirations of the human spirit. Because to paint the unwilling we may have to violate them in ways that belie those noble aspirations. And we may find ourselves wielding ugly brushes, in the conviction that any brush is better than an unpainted surface. And unless we take great care, our actions will have unintended consequences--we will splash a little paint in places we never imagined--and this too is part of our final canvas. Remaking the world is a risky business. Go slow.

This is the best advice I have to give you. No charge.