The original Star Trek beamed subtly liberal messages to its viewers. That is one of the reasons I enjoyed it. It had a multi-ethnic crew…a sense of fairness and justice build on compassion and the common good of all. The crew knew not to interfere with others but knew that sometimes the best thing to do was to disregard the Prime Directive. They knew when to put their phasers on stun and when to use photon torpedoes.

Spock knew that the universe had laws and the laws had to be true if the universe operated as it did. You could believe the Earth was 6,000 years old or that the moon was made of blue cheese…but Spock knew better. If you respected Spock, you had to know that he was not trigger-happy nor heartless. And he sort of represented the yin and yang in all of us…the logical and the emotional. It is all a matter of balance. Yes, it was political. Its creator Gene Roddenberry said as much. To me, that was what I learned from watching Star Trek when it first came out and that is one of the reasons it has endured.

The actors of Star Trek are only mortals. But the characters of Star Trek will be with us for a long time to come as examples of our best intentions…not perfect, but always trying with an open mind and, yes, an open heart, too.

Thank you, Leonard Nimoy, for embracing Spock.

This was one of my favorite Star Trek scenes