“The exclusive worship of the bitch goddess Success is our national disease.” – William James

From “The Human Condition: A User’s Manual,” by Arnold Kunst

8 January

The President [ANY President!] pays dearly for his office. Potomac Fever will cost time and treasure, maybe even spouse and children. He/she will have faced, more than once, the following ethical dilemma: “to do the good I know the country needs I must first win the Presidency, and that may require

• affirming rock-solid principles that [nudge-nudge, wink-wink] won’t exactly pinch my big donors;
• throwing a long-time associate or two under the bus;
• etc” [this last is a broad category indeed!]

 And when he/she has laid all that on the altar of the bitch goddess Success, when he/she has put together just the right program of substance and shadow bought by the American body politic he/she will have 18 months, tops, to translate all that goodness into reality. Because by that first mid-term election the following phrase will begin nipping at the President’s heels with greater and greater insistence: “Lame Duck.”

And life goes on, like a clock ticking calmly, relentlessly, in a thunderstorm – ticking to his demise.

Ain’t life a bitch!