"Which means that the Jersey boys have no reason to be loyal to you. It's just a job. So if there were an opportunity for them to gain some personal advantage by selling you out, turning you into a patsy for them, well, they should just go ahead and do it, right?"
"Uh —"
"Don't worry, it's a rhetorical question. Jersey boys sell you out. You take their fall, they benefit. If there was no institutional loyalty, that's where you'd end up, right? That's the social norm you want."
"No, of course it isn't."
"No, of course not. You want a social norm where individuals can be disloyal to the collective, but not vice versa."
"Yes —"
"Yes, but loyalty is bidirectional. There's no basis on which you may expect loyalty from an institution unless you're loyal to it."
"I suppose."
"You know it. I know it. Institutional loyalty is every bit as much about informed self-interest as personal loyalty is. The Tribe takes care of me, I take care of the Tribe. We'll negotiate a separate payment from Jersey for this — after all, this is outside of the scope of work that we're being paid for — and we'll split the money, down the middle. We'll work in a residual income with Jersey, too, because, as you say, this is bigger than MassPike. It's a genuinely good idea, and there's enough to go around. All right?"
"Are you asking me or telling me?"