Today’s “Founder’s Quote Daily” from a U.S. outfit called The Patriot Post has future president James Madison telling the House of Representatives in 1790 about government borrowing that
I regret, as much as any member, the unavoidable weight and duration of the burdens to be imposed; having never been a proselyte to the doctrine, that public debts are public benefits. I consider them, on the contrary, as evils which ought to be removed as fast as honor and justice will permit.
As too often, I find myself doubting that a politician today could either think or talk this way, there or here. What you see above is not a talking point. It’s an actual thought, expressed in language that came naturally to people habitually fastidious in their reasoning.
Categories: Budget, Economy, Government, Politics, United States
There’s no question that there has been a progressive dumbing-down of political discourse everywhere in the western world, and nowhere moreso than in the United States, where “elite” and “intellectual” are dirty words now. Curious: they expect athletes to perform at the very highest levels, but political leaders who appear smarter than the average Joe are held in contempt. A poly-lingual polymath like Jefferson wouldn’t stand a chance today.
All sides of the political spectrum are guilty. But something is seriously wrong when leadership candidates in one party in particular consider it a virtue to believe that the world is less than 10,000 years old.