Friday, April 16, 2004
I'LL TAKE POLITICAL RHETORIC FOR $1000, ALEX
This quote from Alasdair Gray's 1982, Janine struck me as being particularly timely:
"I am certainly alcoholic, but not a drunkard. I never stagger or stammer, self-control is perfect, the work is not affected. It's well-paid work, I needed an education to get it, but now I can do what is needed and even answer questions without thinking. Most work today can be done like that. If you lobotomised half the nation it would carry on as usual. The politicians do our thinking for us. No they don't."
Yes, that's right, no, they don't. Major politicians, especially. They have a whole staff of lobotomised individuals working under them. And when they're not close at hand, all the politician has to do is wear a goofy smile and repeatedly utter the same response to a host of different pointed questions.
The question to that answer is, obviously, 'What is staying the course?'
This quote from Alasdair Gray's 1982, Janine struck me as being particularly timely:
"I am certainly alcoholic, but not a drunkard. I never stagger or stammer, self-control is perfect, the work is not affected. It's well-paid work, I needed an education to get it, but now I can do what is needed and even answer questions without thinking. Most work today can be done like that. If you lobotomised half the nation it would carry on as usual. The politicians do our thinking for us. No they don't."
Yes, that's right, no, they don't. Major politicians, especially. They have a whole staff of lobotomised individuals working under them. And when they're not close at hand, all the politician has to do is wear a goofy smile and repeatedly utter the same response to a host of different pointed questions.
The question to that answer is, obviously, 'What is staying the course?'
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