jump to navigation

where the dog is buried January 28, 2008

Posted by ocmpoma in : society , trackback

There’s an expression in Russian — vot gde sobaka zaryta! — which translates literally as “That is where the dog is buried!” and means ‘That’s the real problem / heart of the matter / essence of the issue’.

I think that there is one fundamental and completely unavoidable problem with any and all forms of representative government. As I was skimming through Paul Krugman’s text as cited on Economist’s View, I read this bit, lamenting how all-too partisan politics followed a inclusivity-based campaign in the early Clinton Presidency: “So what good did Mr. Clinton’s message of inclusiveness do him?”

I immediately thought to myself, “It got him elected.”

The problem is, the people who will wind up in office in a representative government are those who are good (if not the best) at getting elected, and not at all necessarily those who are good at running a government. In other words, we get politicians, and not statesmen.

Tags for this article:

[?]

Comments»

no comments yet - be the first?