Unless you think Shakespeare missed something important
(?) ought you to be surprised at the repetitive nature of human folly.. or more recently, B. Russell's little cartoon + quip,
Since the beginning man has never refrained from any folly of which he is capable.
Upthread a bit - we have The Ox's link to a nicely iconoclastic description of how we've Bowdlerized even our concept of male/female and built a culture to prevent anyone from realizing just how screwed up we are - on the most basic of levels. (Hey! at least the lady had the balls to take a shot at Mr. M. Chauvinist Pig hisself! Oughtta be worth as many kudos as the Rambo icon, no?).
Checks & Balances. Pondered that one. Given the (obviously declining) attention span du jour, the equally declining individual experience of ever reading.. a variety of 'histories'? and other retrograde indications:
Why would you imagine that 'checks & balances' are anything other than .. Me! and Thee! regurgitating the Obvious, to the Unwilling and often comatose... however ineptly, given we aren't Will S. or Bertie R. ??
*WE* = new people all the time! ARE ALL we ever get of Checks & Balances. Fall asleep for too large a % of a generation, and what you get are:
A Scalia, a Rhenquist; a Dan Quayle, a Dubya ... and recently: GOVERNMENT er "Faith-Based" subsidies and a Calvinist Ashcroft - offended at a STATUE !! (maybe if he has 2 kids, he's fucked twice - and still regrets the shameful experience with such a Godless harlot who would permit it. Oh the Evil Temptress!)
There will be no Final Solution to the forgetfulness of our species; ditto IMHO - no one has yet collected better ingredients for living despite our idiocies: than the US Constitution, product of prodigious minds AND hearts.
We are all Sisyphus here. Best get ready pushing that stone Up the hill from whence it rolled.. in response to the debilitating effects of the Least Common Denominator of homo-saps: the Bone-lazy Opportunist, driven by puerile greed.
Toil + cheers,
Ashton
