Originality and the Long Conversation
A few days ago I was thinking, not for the first time, that politicians like Trump, Kim Jong Un, and Putin appear to have little interest in representing their people. They seem to be in politics primarily for the betterment of their brand, belly, and bank account.
From the perspective of those being governed, the best leaders are probably those who do not want to be leaders: reluctant rulers who do the job to the best of their ability and happily step aside when democracy decides. Eager leaders are more likely to crave power -- and more hesitant to relinquish it.
Because we live so late in humanity’s timeline, many thoughts that feel original have probably been thought before. I am very aware of this, so out of curiosity I looked into who else had expressed a similar idea.
Plato, Cincinnatus, Douglas Adams, and Frank Herbert all expressed versions of the same idea: that people eager to wield power are often the least suited to it. Herbert put it this way:
All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological personalities. It is not that power corrupts but that it is magnetic to the corruptible.
As a consolation to the rest of us, originality does not always have to be the point. We can be content adding a few threads to the tapestry that has been growing for millennia. Mostly ton-sur-ton strands, with occasional flashes of color, but still part of the same enormous, evolving picture.
There is something remarkable about realizing that your thought has already visited the minds of philosophers, writers, and statesmen long gone. Remarkable not because you reached the same conclusion as those great minds, but because, for a moment, you became part of the same conversation.