Public policy, social issues, gender politics, religion, civitas, and other taboo topics fall under the hammer of Shava's iconoclasmic force of natural philosophy.
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Snopes does Menken
Friday, May 06, 2005
9:42 AM
Two great things that go great together! On the urban-myth-checker site snopes.com, a Menken quote I saw recently gets confirmation:
The larger the mob, the harder the test. In small areas, before small electorates, a first-rate man occasionally fights his way through, carrying even the mob with him by force of his personality. But when the field is nationwide, and the fight must be waged chiefly at second and third hand, and the force of personality cannot so readily make itself felt, then all the odds are on the man who is, intrinsically, the most devious and mediocre — the man who can most easily adeptly disperse the notion that his mind is a virtual vacuum.
The Presidency tends, year by year, to go to such men. As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.
H. L. Menken, Baltimore Evening Sun on 26 July 1920
One of the interesting things about this quote is that the circulated version begins with the phrase, As democracy is perfected.... I think the whole quote is far more interesting (especially with my fascination with Howard Dean).
But then, grokking the whole quote might demand that the reader think more, and obviously Americans aren't good at that en masse.
*heh*
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