[jjotto]

"The utopian hope of societal perfection and the desirability of bringing that society into existence holds special allure for intellectuals, for who else is capable of articulating the utopian vision or possesses the requisite knowledge to bring it into existence. Not by coincidence was Pol Pot, whose Khmer Rouge sought to 'restart civilization,' and in the process brought death to over two million Cambodians, a teacher of French literature and history, or Abimael Guzman, the leader of the brutal Shining Path guerillas in Peru, a college philosophy professor."

[ClearCase_guy]

American voters seem to insist on putting Ivy league graduates into power. So far, this has not worked out very well. Perhaps being convinced of your own brilliance is actually a handicap to good leadership.

Some folks make fun of Herman Cain's military strategy ("I'd ask the generals") but to me that sounds like a smart approach, and something that no self-respecting Yale graduate would ever say.

[newheart]

PFL

[infowarrior]

part of an elaborate calculus of how many lives may be snuffed out in the process of perfecting mankind. A firmer grounding in reality may be the best protection against slaughter in the name of the future utopia.

Who defines this 'firmer grounding in reality'? *THE* reality is that mankind cannot perfect itself. Nobody is immune to BHN (that's Basic Human Nature, for those of you in Rio Linda). Thus any attempt to build 'utopia' by *any* human being is doomed from the start.

It appears that this simple cause-effect paradigm is totally beyond most academics, though. I guess it isn't obscure enough for them to comprehend...

the infowarrior