Governing Badly

IN ANCIENT ROME, the emporer Caligula appointed his horse to the Senate. In 1914 Germany declared war on Russia, then attacked France. In 2001 the World Trade Center was destroyed by Saudi Arabians working for Islamic jihadists, and the United states attacked the secularly governed nation of Iraq. The point is, the world seems seldom granted the gift of good governenace, and often seems to bear the burden of bad governance. Sometimes we get lucky, and our leaders say or do something sensible, such as telling the truth, or withdrawing from Viet Nam. Thomas Jefferson said: "I fear for my country when I reflect that God is just". Well, so should we all, dreamy Tom. American statesman, historian, and purveyor or realpolitik George Kennan came through in 1948, when he spoke the following truth: "we have about fifty percent of the world's wealth, but only six point three percent of its population. In this situation, we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national security. To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and daydreaming." Indeed we must, and do. Aside from the ostensibly contradictory term "positive detriment", the message is clear: if you have everything and nobody else has anything, most likely you'll have to plan and act vigorously in order to retain the status quo, for the wolves, hungry, will be at the door. Now that's inspired leadership, and honest too! Or how about this: "though the object of being a great power is to be able to fight a great war, the only way of remaining a great power is to not fight a great war." (A.J.P. taylor). Or try this one: "people never lie so much as after a hunt, during a war, or before an election." (Otto von Bismarck). Today, we are given the inanities of the Bush clan, which could fill a tear off calendar for years. ("this is still the greatest natin in the country". (george H.W. Bush) Or behold the spectacle of an American president contemplating the meaning of the word "is". Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, takling about the lack of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, articulated, "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." As the Russian proverb goes, "a country without its Tsar is like a village without its idiot."