Being a nerd I sometimes open an encyclopedia at random and start reading.  I always learn something interesting, like that some scholars believe the biblical Ten Commandments, rather than having been given to Moses on top of mount Sinai, evolved from ancient Hebrew cooking rules.

Regardless of where they came from, though, the Ten Commandments provide a time-honored blueprint for moral living.  One need not be religious to appreciate a moral code that teaches that lying, stealing and killing are wrong.  The Ten Commandments are particularly revered by conservatives, and more than once stone renderings of them have been erected in front of Southern courthouses and on other government property (much to the chagrin of those who support the separation of Church and State).

Given conservative’s regard for the Ten Commandments it’s always puzzled me why they are so supportive of the death penalty – after all, it would seem to be explicitly forbidden by “Thou shalt not kill.”  But reason and belief have always been uneasy bedfellows and many religiously sincere people have no problem rationalizing the State killing people in their name.

Traditionally executions have been great crowd pleasers.  As recently as the late 1800s public executions drew large crowds – including families with children.  And though executions are now done in private, when Nebraska resumed executions in the 1990s large crowds gathered outside the penitentiary in Lincoln, drinking and shouting for blood.  This so alarmed officials that executions were soon moved from midnight to morning when those who celebrate killing would hopefully be at work.

Politicians understand that many Nebraskans seem to have a deep attachment to capital punishment — for decades state senator Ernie Chambers sought the repeal of the death penalty without success.  So it came as a great surprise when the Legislature did, in fact, repeal it in 2015 with enough support to override Governor Ricketts’ veto.

Ricketts, who comes from a very wealthy family, sidestepped his responsibility to enforce the will of the Legislature by helping fund a ballot initiative to reinstate capital punishment – an initiative that will appear on the ballot this November.

Anti-death penalty advocates have swayed many conservatives by pointing out that it costs Nebraska far too much money – over $14 million a year by one recent estimate – to litigate the seemingly endless appeals the death penalty creates (underscoring the degree to which conservative ideology is influenced by money).

Yes, cost is a valid reason to end executions, as is the increasing evidence that innocent people are sometimes convicted of capital crimes.  But ultimately state-sponsored killing is a moral issue – those who truly believe killing is wrong (except as a last resort to save one’s life or the life of another) understand that executing people is wrong as well.

I suspect that most of us have reacted emotionally to news of heinous crimes by wanting to hurt the perpetrator (I know I have).  But moral codes were developed precisely for these situations – they steer us away from our darker impulses.

Evidence indicates that the death penalty does not deter violent crime, and arguments based on “an eye for an eye” – a fundamental aspect of Islamic Sharia law — should not shape modern Western society.  Yet ironically many of the same voices who warn against Sharia law are staunch supporters of this medieval approach to justice.

With Nebraskans having an important choice to make this November regarding capital punishment, one can only hope the better angels of our nature guide our decision…

They say a penny saved is a penny earned and that a stitch in time saves nine.  We all grow up hearing sayings like these, sayings that encapsulate folk wisdom into easily digested sound bites.  One should never count one’s chickens before they hatch, for example, or even put all of one’s eggs in the same basket lest it be dropped, breaking them all.

One of the most popular sayings is “if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.”  Persistence is so important to success that we are persistently reminded of this in many ways.  Rags to riches stories often feature a persistent hero, as do fairy tales and graduation speeches.

Thomas Edison, one of America’s greatest inventors, once said he hadn’t failed, he’d just found “10,000 ways that won’t work.”  Persistence was the hallmark of Edison’s worldview – he defined genius, for example, as “one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration,” meaning that even the best idea isn’t worth anything without the hard work required to realize it.

And yet we are also told that “doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results” is the very definition of insanity and we often refer persistent people as being “OCD,” implying they suffer from an obsessive compulsive psychological disorder. Maybe that’s why the figure of the “mad scientist” and “mad composer” are such integral parts of our culture.  They refer to an individual so caught up in realizing his dreams that he becomes mentally unbalanced.

I thought about these opposing views of persistence recently while watching a movie called Rudy with my son Thomas.  Rudy is the true story of a not-too-talented, not-too-smart young man from a blue collar background whose dream was to play football for Notre Dame.  To realize his dream Rudy had to work harder than other students to get acceptable grades and, despite his best efforts, was only good enough to play on the team that runs other schools’ plays in practice so the first string can get an idea of what they’ll face.  Season after season Rudy got pummeled by larger, more talented players, with no hope of ever actually getting into a game.  Finally, though, the starters took pity on Rudy and forced their coach to put him in at the end of a game.

Rudy achieved his dream through his persistence, which gradually won him the respect of the rest of the team.  But he suffered terribly for a long time to reach that point, and though he graduated from a top college, all he really got for his football efforts was the grudging respect of his father and brother (though he presumably gained a lot of respect for himself).

I couldn’t help but wonder if Rudy was heroic or crazy, and finally decided he was both.  And I imagine there are a lot of people who, like Rudy, seem a bit crazy in their dedication to achieving their dreams.  I imagine there are also plenty of people happy to point this out to them (like Rudy’s family members in the movie).

Whether a persistent person is viewed as crazy or not probably depends on if he eventually succeeds.  That possibility suggests that successful people may seem a little bit crazy in their zeal to realize their dreams.  I can’t help but wonder if, like Rudy, we’d all be more successful if we’d pay less attention to the people who tell us what we can’t do and more time following our dreams…