We Tried Everything Else, Now Let’s Be Ethical
Now that hope has failed and desperation has hit the streets perhaps we should explore a radical experiment left to us: the gambit of ethics.
I propose that we elect a ‘Philosopher King’ like that which Plato imagined in his Republic. King, Queen, it doesn’t matter, what matters is the quality of the person and the motives behind.
Take Thomas Jefferson’s advice and set fire to his work.
No amount of paperwork will do, it is something you gotta see for yourself align in the words and in the eyes. You are a human being, not a computer, act like one!
Allow the channels of sentiment to flow freely in Congress, let hearts bleed to be heard.
Have him or her cloistered away from any tangible riches, left to defend choices using an agreeable logic that appeals to the equilibrium of our collected human qualities.
John Ralston Saul counted them: Imagination, Reason, Emotion, Ethics, Memory, Intuition, Common sense. Each empowering the other by being used in tandem.
Our job is to know our qualities, and have the time set aside to do so.
For the Philosopher King we must divorce power from decision but retain accountability. To be the first to be sacrificed, if things fail.
If he or she is the right candidate, there would be no issue here. Find the right person and stop advertising to the wrong ones.
Govern not like one would a household for the analogy scales poorly, but as one would from a place of holistic self-interest, the body politic.
Because your body depends on it.
We require the saint without the hagiography
Praise instead the riches of the approach (let the self-made man die alone in his villa).
Cultivated opinions matter, but those tied neither to the idea of culture nor what it signifies in furtive glances, but only in how any perspective adds dimension to an issue.
Knowing more than one language would not be frowned upon.
The Philosopher King will not be invited to your barbecue. The charisma of results shall instead prevail.
