And by “daddy” I mean who’s your favorite Founding Father? Lincoln doesn’t count. Everybody wants a piece of him but he wasn’t even born yet. So, who then? Washington? Adams? Nobody ever picks my guy. The DIY-dude with the associative mind. If he were alive today he’d have invented Google. 

Not saying he was a saint. Far from it—dropped out of school at age ten, couldn’t hold a job, got a girl knocked up. In his defense, though, he did support the boy when the baby-mama ran off. Somehow I like the fact that he never tried to deny his shortcomings or his struggles with sin. He published scolding to-do lists that read every bit like AA prayers; like a man who had to talk himself into being good one day at a time: Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation. Just faking it until he made it, like the rest of us.

What I admire most about him was his can-do spirit. He saw real virtue in getting things done, in solving problems. And he was humble enough to know he couldn’t do it all himself. Where’d the country be today without his cooperatives: libraries, fire departments, the postal service? 

Which is not to say he was averse to making a buck. Like Hamilton, he surely appreciated commerce. Maybe even more than Hamilton because of his hardscrabble start. But it wasn’t all about short-term gain or rigging the game for his stiff-wigged pals. He thought of those who’d come after him; set up a trust fund on his patents that’s still paying out for Philly folk today. You can’t beat that. Yes, Ben Franklin, you are my BFF—my Best Founding Father.