Dear George,
One of the more overworked quotations in contemporary history is Lord Acton’s dictum that power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Everybody spouts it; nobody thinks about it. Of course, power corrupts. What would be the point of pursuing power if it did not? Corruption is liberating. For a brief moment, a man is an Ubermench, until the indictments start rolling in.
That not withstanding how is it that power breeds corruption. What are the dynamic forces that make this possible?
Power corrupts when the need for efficiency becomes a fetish. This is especially true in a democracy with the messy and boring discussion and debate required for democratic decision making. The man corrupted by power has no patience for this jawboning. He wants action now, even if this action is replacing a broken office coffee maker. (Cyril Northcote Parkinson pointed out that there would be more discussion in a meeting over replacing a coffee maker than building a dam. This is because everyone knows about coffee makers, but nobody knows a damn thing about dam building.)
To facilitate the fetishication of efficiency, the good leader must spin fantasies of threat out of thin air. Threats, real or imagined, encourage the consolidation of power.
Acton also said, “Where you have a concentration of power in a few hands, all too frequently men with the mentality of gangsters get control.”
Duh!
Who else is qualified to wield absolute power? Surely your administration has proven Acton true.
The ability to neutralize an opponent with the stroke of a pen or a bullet to the head is a holdover from the adolescent fantasy world of easy solutions and easy sex. Lose the sex and you end up with the nastiest bipod ever to walk the face of the earth—the puritanical gangster.
Finally, there is a reason men are better suited to power than women are. We are the poor bastards who have to get it up, and this makes for a great deal of strutting and posturing.
So, power on George, you fit the mold beautifully.
Your admirer,
Belacqua Jones
6:47:21 AM 
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