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August 5, 2013
"The beauty of military dictatorship."
If we must have a republic, I recommend the “banana” variety.Generals, in the main, are men of little imagination, & simple tastes. They love order, to be sure, but in the balance of public vices, a little order is seldom a bad thing. They are not easily infected by ideology, or any other form of intellectual ambition; even those who acquire some may lose it after a while. They don’t much care what one is doing, so long as it will not threaten the peace, or otherwise interfere with their breakfast. Should the general be smart enough to fully understand his need to avoid free elections, he will become unobtrusive. He won’t go out of his way to antagonize anyone. He may line his own pockets, & those of his friends — for as Valéry said, “Power without abuse loses its charm.” But the odd billion into a Swiss bank account is a small price to pay for freedom.David Warren -- Arab autumn?
Posted by gerardvanderleun at August 5, 2013 6:59 AM. This is an entry on the sideblog of American Digest: Check it out.
Your Say
Thanks. I loved that and wouldn't have found it on me own.
Posted by: pbird at August 6, 2013 7:26 AM
And, exactly, which of our current crop of generals would we pick to be our Commandante?
Posted by: BillH at August 6, 2013 8:09 AM
If the nice people keep sitting on the sidelines waiting to react the next step will be Ceaserism. Thank God Colin Powell may now be out of the running for that job.
Wouldn't you at least like to call your Congressmen and Senators and yell at them. It's not hard. It's almost certainly a free call. Tell them you are mad as hell and you are getting him fired as soon as you can make it happen. They already think you are a schmuck. They have some reason for that opinion, we done little to even threaten their cushy job. Call and be heard, every week or every day.
Posted by: Scott M at August 7, 2013 2:55 AM