Inquiry into the nature of good and evil in kids

There are people in this world who believe that children, unsullied by the dirty tricks and ethical malfeasence at work in the world, are paragons of innocence and virtue. These people, not to put too fine a point on it, have absolutely no idea what they're talking about.

I have four kids. I have watched two of them grow into fine young men and am crossing my fingers with the younger two. So I have some degree of expertise in this area. Children are, by and large, a class of very short grifters.

I'm talking here about kids who know the difference between right and wrong, and because they do, can parse ethical questions with Clintonesque aplomb. When push comes to shove, as it sometimes does on the playground, they will claim that the best intelligence available indicated that Jimmy had weapons of mass destruction in his back pocket, so there.

Children also have a keen sense of justice, as shown by the sheer number of times they can cry, "IT'S NOT FAIR!" in the course of a single day.

Ethics is hard work. So hard, in fact, that many adults just give up on it: Ken Lay, for example.
But we parents try to impart the time-tested virtues to our children. Virtuous living is not always rewarded in this world, so self-interest is not always the most persuasive of arguments.
If children can come to see that there are more important things in this life than base self-interest, that love and justice have deeper and broader roots than self, then we have made a great leap in our goal to raise those who will become good men and women one day.