Yes, failure is an option -- ask Roger Goodell and the NFL owners

Morning, noon and night, we as individuals are exhorted to do the right thing (although not necessarily in those particular words).

It's seems both impossible and irresponsible to argue against such moral advice.

Now granted, we periodically fail to adhere to such a code because we are human -- our feet of clay make make both foreseen and unforeseen appearances because of our decisions and behavior. But our decisions generally do not have uber serious implications.

So it's not surprising when someone like NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, despite what should be the best-money-can-buy legal and public relations counsel, has failed miserably.

Why did he permanently attach clay to his shoes and thus now endanger his massive multi-million dollar salary and billion dollar industry?

Because first and foremost in his mind was the duty of damage limitation, a mindset of doing what he thought best for the corporation rather than ethically embrace the simplicity of what he knew was right and wrong.

Also count certain (if not all) NFL team owners, general managers as like-minded.

Yet, as many have pointed out, what if Ray Rice or Greg Hardy had assaulted a member of Goodell's family or that of Baltimore Raven owner Steve Busciotti or Carolina Panther owner Jerry Richardson?

Rice and Hardy would have quickly disappeared into football oblivion.

All this isn't even a matter of getting ahead of the narrative or influencing its direction. It's embracing denial and not dealing with the problem of abuse of individuals by NFL employees. The NFL has 'handled' this just like the similarly longterm issue of brain injuries suffered by those on the field -- deny, bury, obfuscate, cover up.

Again why?

Dollars and cents.

Roger Goodell has brought unprecedented wealth to himself and those who employ him. That is a undisputed fact.

But at what cost to him personally but much, much more importantly to so many others suffering from the scars of physical and emotional savagery?

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Mike Hill tweeted on September 18: "Why does it take the OUTRAGE of the internet/social media for people of power to do the things they should just morally do?"

Also, please read this compelling article form Louisa Thomas.

Patrick Hruby rips the NFL a new one over the proposed settlement surrounding the brain injury lawsuit.