There's a difference between a leader and an office holder.
Love him or hate him, Patrick Manning was a leader, one with a vision of what he wanted to accomplish, who had the courage of his convictions.
We disagreed politically in ways that could never have been easily reconciled, still I came to have respect for him as a person and the level of sacrifice he was prepared to make in pursuit of his own dreams.
Ours is a nation not easily led, and it can be said that he did what he must have thought to have been his best. No one can fault him for that.
Today, out of respect for the personal sacrifices he and his family have made and in reverence for the public offices he held, the nation's flags and the flags of our hearts should be flown at half mast.
Let his passing be a somber reminder that ultimately it ends, and that whatever opportunities we get on the grand stage of life between birth and death, let us use them wisely, to make a better world for those left to mourn and to remember.
Sincere condolences to his loved ones, may he rest in peace.
Phillip Edward Alexander
Activist