How good fathers react to adversity in their kids' lives.

My online pal Don Gwinn found that his boy had been taunted because of a situation that could have been prevented:

Kane's class had a mock election yesterday.

Kane voted for McCain. The rest of the day, the other kids taunted him and called him a racist. It was a pretty good preparation for adult political discourse, come to think of it. We had a little talk about it, and I gave him the same advice I give grownups--if you know you're not a racist, what do you care what "they" say? Being called a racist is a sure sign that you're winning an argument, anyway.

I'd like to say that I would have been this reasonable in my response to such a situation, but the truth is, my first reaction probably would have been to get fired up with anger toward the teacher for setting up such an incident. Only after I had blown out might I have done as Don did, which was to see this for what it was: an opportunity to teach his son a valuable lesson that he could carry into manhood.

I believe that I've mentioned before that Don's on my Hero List.