Generally speaking, people shouldn’t murder their wives and innocent bystanders and get away with it. Nonetheless I don’t feel great pleasure at OJ’s conviction and sentencing. There are many prominent people, among them those who lied us into Iraq, who deserve serious prison time as much as Simpson.

I never followed his career nor any of his trials very carefully, but do have a small OJ story to relate. About four years ago, I was in a Miami restaurant with my family, and my son pointed out r that OJ was sitting across the room. It was the first day of vacation and I was in a giddy mood, so when he got up and was talking to some people I went over with one of my daughters to chat with him. Out of some sense of the macabre, I took a photo of him standing with my daughters.

We chatted briefly. He was like a good politician, inquisitive about you. In about thirty seconds of questioning –“Where are you from?” “Where did you go to school?”, “Where did your father go to school?” ,– he had found a person we knew in common. (Louis Marx, who had been my father’s friend and business partner in the late 60’s, early 70’s, and is, I believe, Daniel Ellsberg’s father in law).

Make of it what you want, but I doubt having that conversation with many pro athletes.