If you can't trust a boy scout…

For a columnist, finding irony in governmental policies, corporate actions or international relations can be wonderful, or at best a self-writing column. Unfortunately, the same situation is often tragic from a citizen's point-of-view.\nSuch is the case with Douglas S. Smith, Jr. Those of you who were ever involved, or had a family member involved with the Boy Scouts might remember his printed signature on letters regarding Scout programming. \nMost of us probably remember the controversy surrounding Boy Scouts of America v. Dale. This, of course, is the Supreme Court case that protected the Boy Scouts' First Amendment right to bar openly gay men from the organization. In the proceedings, the Boy Scouts argued that the Scout oath requires participants to promise to be "morally straight," and that homosexuality does not fit within the Boy Scouts' vision.\nNow, Smith, the former director of programming and chairman of the Youth Protection League (whose purpose is to alert scouts about the dangers of the Internet), is facing charges of receiving and distributing child pornography.\nI'd like to make a joke about how kiddy porn fits within an ideology of so-called "moral straightness," but I don't think I could write a joke so funny that it does justice to the children whose exploitation was implicitly aided by Smith.\nHis lawyer told CNN that "I would hate to see the entirety of his life and the good things he's done defined by one incident." Note that he said "one incident," without a modifier.\nGranted, a lawyer is supposed to support his client, but justifying his actions with "well, he only did it once," is nothing less than outrageous. Especially when children are harmed and especially when the perpetrator is a high-ranking official in an organization for children. \nSmith retired in February after the BSA learned of the charges and put him on administrative leave, yet I searched its Web site for information regarding the charges and found nothing -- no official apology to the members, no condemnation of such a heinous act, just an ignorance-is-bliss mentality.\nObviously, morality BSA-style does not cover lies by omission.\nOnce CNN got hold of the story, BSA did make a statement. The organization's leaders told reporters that they were "shocked and dismayed" by the allegations, but only with the qualifier "he was in more administrative positions ... not in direct contact with the youth." \nAlthough the statement was clearly made to ease parents' fears, it comes across more as "don't worry, we don't let the pornographers in our administration deal directly with children; they just decide the programming for them."\nThis was a time when the best way to save face would have been to not try to save face. The BSA should have issued an official apology and a reaffirmation of their commitment to children with a condemnation of Smith's action not qualified with "at least ... "\nI fear that this incident will not be seen as tantamount to child molestation and child endangerment. They were just pictures, right? He didn't physically abuse any of the children in the pictures.\nExcept that by being involved with a child pornography ring funds further exploitation of children. More than likely, the lives of those children have already been ruined by the treatment they have received at the hands of adults, but funding the kiddy porn industry funds the ruination of more children's lives.\nWhen an organization claiming to serve children has the audacity to bar other children from participating based on sexual orientation, an intrinsic trait, they better have the moral character to do the right thing, even when it means condemning one of their own.\nOnly time will tell if the public is as outraged as they should be.