"It profits me but little that a vigilant authority always protects the tranquillity of my pleasures and constantly averts all dangers from my path, without my care or concern, if this same authority is the absolute master of my liberty and my life."

--Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America

Saturday, November 23, 2013

Ford Madox Ford on Obama

I'm reading the great tetralogy of novels collectively called Parade's End, by Ford Madox Ford, about British society before, during and after World War I.   A great, great work of art.   But this description jumped out at me:

That was the quality of his entanglements, their very essence.   He got into appalling messes, unending and unravellable -- no, she meant un-unravellable -- messes and other people suffered for him whilst he mooned along into more messes.

Sounds a good deal like our narcissistic, "so smart everything bores him" President.  

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