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Hello, fellow ZSR-ites. I’m a bit groggy after traveling all day. Got here in time to check into the room with Wanda and then head over to the convention center. First person I see is Jim Williams, Dean of Libraries at Colorado-Boulder, and an old friend of mine (from the 70’s!) from Wayne State.

The conference keynote speaker canceled at the last minute but ACRL had a back-up in line, so we heard a fine speech by Rushworth Kidder who spoke generally about ethics and specifically about the topics in his latest book, The Ethics Recession: Reflections on the Moral Underpinnings of the Current Economic Crisis. He described an ethical dilemma as one being between right and right, rather than right and wrong. He congratulated librarians for standing for ethics, that is, for trying to find the “higher” right. I like that.

Kidder says we, in America, are in an ethics recession, threatening free enterprise and democracy, and need to build a national culture of integrity. Pundits typically frame questions in either the language of economics (bottom line) or politics (power)but we are now moving on to ethics, as crises like Bernie Madoff have set off a moral outrage seething through the country. He described four drivers of dilemmas: truth v loyalty, individual v community, short-term v long term, and justice v mercy (I confess I borrowed this sentence from a twitter feed set up on the Virtual Conference when I got distracted for a minute – not bad for an old woman, eh?) His definition of moral courage (another book of his) is willing endurance in significant danger for the sake of principle. He gives librarians credit for being willing to face the tough issues and act as standard-bearers for our communities. His last point was that law will rush in to fill the void if there is a dearth of ethics; self regulation is ethics, external regulation is law.

After the keynote, everyone rushed down to the Exhibits, where Wanda and I met up with Susan, Roz and Mary Beth, and where it seemed like I ran into everyone I’ve ever known. That’s one of the great things about library conferences!