As a classically trained dog, my spirit descends directly from Argus, the loyal and fearless hunting hound of Odysseus, the King of Ithaca in Homer’s The Odyssey.
The Odyssey was penned around 10,000 years ago, and it’s the original epic journey-and-homecoming story in all of literature.
Six centuries later, the Greeks were still working out their nascent democracy and had learned a few home truths that Argus could have taught them if they’d bothered to ask — like how to lead the pack by looking after all the other dogs.
Athens’ democratic assembly was an arena filled with noisy argument, unconstrained by any commitment to facts or truth: Socrates was sentenced to death by a narrow democratic vote after admonishing the Athenians for elevating popular opinion at the expense of truth.
His diligent student Plato went on to predict that letting people govern themselves would eventually lead the masses to support the rule of tyrants. So even before Aristotle and his students formed the basic concepts and principles of logic, power belonged to those who could capture the will of the people by manipulating their emotions rather than offering evidence and facts.
The Boss nods at this, agreeing that nothing much has changed in 2500 years. The early science fiction writer, Robert Heinlein, observed in the 1980s that “You can sway a thousand men by appealing to their prejudices quicker than you can convince one man by logic.”
“It’s something The Donald is particularly good at, General,” he tells me. “Democracy has always been vulnerable to the demagogue, but in the time of social media, disinformation and rumour spreads around the world in seconds.”
The Boss reckons Trump sowed the seeds nearly a decade ago when he started his run, demeaning accomplished public figures such as Senator John McCain, a war hero. He followed by insulting veterans “who got caught”.
As his insults were shared and amplified online, it brought Heinlein’s further observation to mind: “A dying culture invariably exhibits personal rudeness ... A loss of politeness, of gentle manners, is more significant than is a riot.”
The Boss called his old mate Scott in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, on Tuesday after he saw a reliable poll suggesting Kamala Harris was ahead in that very red state. “The women will decide this election,” Scott assured him. Maybe.
They agreed that, whatever happens, The Donald has unleashed disruptive forces that could take a generation or more to repair.
He has given young men, despots and the disaffected permission to behave badly; he has sowed deep mistrust in the election process and in the country’s institutions. He has condoned violence and vowed vengeance against his enemies.
Back in 1920, the journalist H.L. Mencken mischievously took the baton from the Greeks, and ran with it: “As democracy is perfected, the office of the president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day, the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be occupied by a downright moron."
But even the cynical Mencken couldn’t foresee a narcissistic, vengeful and dangerous moron. Woof!
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