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"But the chief penalty is to be governed by someone worse if a man will not himself hold office and rule. It is from fear of this, as it appears to me, that the
by yters 9y ago
"But the chief penalty is to be governed by someone worse if a man will not himself hold office and rule. It is from fear of this, as it appears to me, that the better sort hold office when they do, and then they go to it not in the expectation of enjoyment nor as to a good thing, but as to a necessary evil and because they are unable to turn it over to better men than themselves."
- Plato, Republic, Book 1, section 347c
- hyperpallium 9y ago“The major problem—one of the major problems, for there are several—one of the many major problems with governing people is that of whom you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them. To summarize: it is a well-known fact that those people who most want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it. To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job. To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem” - Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
- musage 9y ago> I'm more than ever of the opinion that a decent human existence is possible today only on the fringes of society, where one then runs the risk of starving or being stoned to death. In these circumstances, a sense of humor is a great help. -- Hannah Arendt
- __s 9y agoReplacing electing a president with picking a president by lottery where every citizen is elligible (if they decline, move to the next person on the list) is still democracy: over time the opinions of the presidents in aggregate will be representational of how widespread those opinions are in the population
- petra 9y agoIn some Hunter gatherer societies, leaders weren't people who wanted that job,but people who were selected by the community to do it.