Trump and Obama - twins having different mothers

Dangerous Quotes – the talking points of our world. Many if not most Americans are moved by quotes, in fact simple quotes.  Here are three that may resonate.

• What’s good for General Motors is good for the country.
• Power to the people.
• In God’s name … (fill it in)

Today we consider a quote from Cervantes’ Don Quixote. “When life itself seems lunatic, who knows where madness lies? Perhaps to be too practical is madness. To surrender dreams — this may be madness. Too much sanity may be madness — and maddest of all: to see life as it is, and not as it should be!”
 

Persuasive? Yes.  Articulate? Yes. Simple? Yes. Accurate?  Well, maybe but…  It is completely open ended, without any indication of what “should be”  should be.  It leaves to the reader the full imagination of possible worlds that could be.  It is attractive to a spectrum of opinion.  The most ardent Nazi and most dedicated Communist can both rally around.

This is one problem today in the USA and even Europe.  Too many see an America as they envision it, irrespective of what it is, irrespective of what it might be, and irrespective of what is possible. The mantra is,

Nothing is impossible if  only you believe.

There can be no question that life for the many can be better, but for some group (such as the progressives) to put as an action item a world where life is better in their particular way is even a greater madness.  This is an invention and then distortion of truth.

Cervantes' quote amounts to a single talking point whereby one makes an interpretation without qualification, where a few make decisions to reform an entire world, and where they cleverly articulate their view to the many. 

This is the stuff of Utopian worlds so much adored by the naive yet so much damned by the experienced. Indeed, the committed activist has little time or capacity for philosophical subtleties.  He or she must act. The committed activist must transmit a simple message, one that resonates, proposing followers will have a better life if only they adhere. 

Even more remarkable is that activists for the new world order usually have little sophistication beyond their single talking point that the “world should be this or that.”

Allowing a little politics here, we note that Donald Trump and Barack Obama are entirely similar, with both promising hope and change, and both without specifics.  Trump and Obama are twins but from opposite poles, each offering a promise for what should be. We suspect similarity of methods. The other Republicans and Democrats simply do not recognize this present force.

Dangerous are the words of Cervantes.