The two greatest obstacles to democracy in the United States are, first, the widespread delusion among the poor that we have a democracy, and second, the chronic terror among the rich, lest we get it.”
-Edward Dowling
(Thanks to Ryan Safner at Republic versus Democracy)
“Democracy is a form of worship. It is the worship of jackals by jackasses.”
“Democracy is the pathetic belief in the wisdom of collective ignorance.”
— H.L.Mencken
🙂
Ha ha…
love those.
thanks a lot, yogi.
My favorite Mencken quote, “an election is an advanced auction of stolen goods.”
And my own personal one-liner:
..with apologies to Emerson…
“A foolish foreign policy is the hobgoblin of a failed presidency.”
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The greatest Democratic delusion is simply the delusion that democracy is *good*.
A dictatorship is one fallible, power-hungry fool imposing his will on those who disagree with him.
An oligarchy is a small group of fallible, power-hungry fools imposing their will on those who disagree with them.
A democracy is a majority of fallible, power-hungry fools imposing their will on those who disagree with them.
You have to wonder what is worse. A dictator can be overthrown. Who’s going to overthrow the majority of society?
The only thing keeping a minority (including individuals) safe in a democracy is the flimsy excuse that we have something in common (the false notion that we have can choose how to run our own lives).
But it hasn’t saved any one of us from state-sanctioned robbery.
I hope for the sake of the individual that neither the poor nor the rich completely get what they want, which politically speaking is the state to help them get it.