August 9, 2026

Whoever knows the interior of affairs, must be sensible to how many more events the faults of statesmen give birth, than are produced by good intentions. [Put another way, those “in the know” know that whatever politicians do with good intentions are outweighed by what they do otherwise—perhaps out of inadvertence, laziness, or sheer disinterest.]

Horace Walpole (1717-1797), English writer, in 1754; Memoirs of the Reign of George II (1846), vol.  1, Jay p.377

MEDITATION: Assuming you are or were a politician, when have your political mistakes taught you more than your good intentions ever did? Never? Really?

COMMENTARY: Walpole understood that failure drives history far more than virtue. In politics, the road to hell isn’t paved with good intentions—it’s patched with good ones badly executed, sometimes disastrously so.