Three American Ideas

Yesterday, I read HL Mencken's "Prejudices" on-line. I can't remember which blog led me to it, so I can't tip my hat. In one essay, HLM remarked that much of what passes for intellectual discourse in America consists of variations on three ideas: (1) democracy; (2) that it is a sin to be wealthy; and (3) that other folks' enjoyment is intolerable.

I think HL was on to something and that this observation still holds up today. Democracy is acclaimed as an unadulterated good, and debate is limited to how to administer it or improve it or have more of it. The term "undemocratic" is almost always pejorative. The "problem" of disparities in wealth and the concern with redistribution use up a lot of air and ink, and debate is reduced to a discussion about how much to let taxpayers keep of their own money to optimize public revenue to be doled out. Finally, nannies and busybodies are everywhere making sure that folks don't enjoy sex too much or smoke or gamble or eat deep fried foods. There's not much else to occupy the punditry or the intelligentsia than the three stupid ideas identified by HL.

I reckon that democracy is about the most idiotic way to select officeholders that could ever be conceived of. No other system is as certain to result in the selection of scoundrels. We would be far better off if officeholders were chosen at random by lot or on some other basis than the whim of the electorate. I say we want less democracy and that it is time for undemocratic ideas to get a hearing.

Prosperity is no sin if you come about it honestly. On the other hand, envy is a sin. It's not prosperity that is problematic; it's shady practices and corruption and undue privilege.

And let us mind our own business quite a bit more than we seem willing to do so far. If your neighbor's amusements are not to your tastes, what is that to you? I don't gamble. I think it's idiotic to gamble. But I don't reckon that I should try to impose my views on this matter (or a lot of other matters for that matter) on anyone else. This is a virtue that I would like to see more widely distributed in the population. I reckon every utterance about regulating other people's behaviors or vices should be challenged at once and up front by inquiring of the utterer what business it of his. By what stretch do you claim to be a stakeholder in another's doings?