In the three score and ten years I’ve been around, our society has changed a great deal. I’m not talking about the United States becoming a super power or about it growing from radio to TV to the communication age. I’m talking about our attitude toward life; our morality if you will.

Our movies are a good example of that change. In the thirties and forties there were many morality plays in which Frank Capra directed such hits as “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,” “It’s a Wonderful Life” and others. That’s dramatically changed through the years and in 1987, Michael Douglas playing Gordon Gekko proclaimed in the movie, “Wall Street” that “Greed is Good.”

I was watching Bill Moyers’ program the other night and the author of “A Tragic Legacy: How Good vs. Evil destroyed the Bush Presidency,” was a guest. The author, Glenn Greenwald, stated that Bush fell captive to Manichean thinking during his presidency. That there are no greys only good and evil and if you are on the side of good, all things are justified and there are no limits on your actions. This was espoused by Persian philosopher Manes in the third century B.C.

Now, I don’t think that Bush and his advisors knew of or called their actions Manichean. But I do think that our society condones actions that lead to what we perceive as good and Bush could just have followed what he thought society wanted and approved.

This can be seen in the sports world. It seems that almost anything is OK as long as it leads to good — us winning. Pro football seems to encourage cheating. To its most successful coach Bill Bilichick winning is everything, “winning is morality.” In other words winning is good and losing is evil. Bilichick will go to any lengths to win. He videotaped opposing teams’ signals, Spygate, leading to a $500,000 fine. What most consider morality does not play a role in his striving to win. That includes all aspects of football including players’ health.

Cyclist Floyd Landis was caught doping with an illegal level of testosterone in his body after the Tour de France. NASCAR’s Michael Waltrop was caught with an illegal substance in his car’s engine.

Perhaps the poster boy for illegal substances, Barry Bonds has not been severely punished except on the field of public opinion. And although Bonds could still hit and add to his home run total, he could not get a job last season. It remains to be seen if he will be voted into baseball’s Hall of Fame. If I had a vote, he would not get it.

We like to think that our Minnesota teams reflect our ethics. Some people have called the Midwest, “The last bastion of morality.” Maybe so, but our Minnesota Vikings do not represent our state very well in this respect when held up to the mirror.

Think of the Love Boat incident, the Whizzinator and recently, tackle Bryant McKinnie receiving a four-game suspension for his last bar fight, along with Ray Edwards and Jared Allen being fined for late hits, etc. In today’s society we excuse such behavior if they play for us.

So maybe we can’t blame George Bush for his actions. After all, he is a sports fan, in fact, owned part of the Texas Rangers at one time. He just wanted to win and leave his name in the history books.

We try to teach our youngsters fair play and sportsmanship, but it is becoming increasingly difficult with the examples of the “heroes” they see on the national scene.

We’ve come a long way from the morality of the past and Grantland Rice’s: “When the one great scorer comes to write against your name, he marks — not that you won or lost — but how you played the game.”