try to pretend that everything is determined by legality and individual merit. They like to believe it has nothing to do with heredity, or accident of birth, or who went to school with who. Everything is supposed to be orderly, like planets orbiting the sun, each in their predictable track. But the conflict between ideals and personal loyalties warps the entire structure, like an invisible sun passing through the solar system, its gravity dragging orbits out of alignment and causing havoc.
