Leadership and Self-Deception, 2nd Edition

18 Leadership in the Box

“My youngest boy, Cory, who’s now almost 40, was a handful. Drugs, drinking—you name it, he did it. Everything came to a head when he was arrested for selling drugs during his senior year in high school.

“At first I wanted to deny it. No Herbert ever did drugs. And to sell them—that was unthinkable. I stomped around demanding that this injustice be exposed. It couldn’t be true. Not about my boy. So I demanded a full trial. Our lawyer recommended against it, and the district attorney offered a plea bargain that included only 30 days in jail. But I wouldn’t have it. ‘I’ll be damned if my son is ever going to go to jail,’ I said. And so we fought.

“But we lost, and Cory ended up spending a full year in the youth detention ...