August 16, 2026

Politics is the diversion of trivial men who, when they succeed at it, become important in the eyes of more trivial men.

George Jean Nathan (1882 – 1958), American critic, The Cynic’s Lexicon, Jonathon Green, ed. (London: 1986), p. 154

MEDITATION: Assuming you are an office-holder, how would you respond to the charge of being a trivial person? It may help to consider which of your colleagues have you impressed over the course of your career? Those who deserve your respect in turn, or the inveterate dissemblers, self-appointed saviours, or idiots?

COMMENTARY: A critic of such renown as Nathan should not confuse the actors with the activity. Politicians can be trivial, but politics itself is consequential. Misplayed, it can lead to insurrections and indeed civil war. And it has.