the whimsical first movement of Violin Concerto no. 1, featuring Wilhelm Friedemann Herzog, playing - Bill Clinton

Violin Concerto no. 1, featuring Wilhelm Friedemann Herzog,

Scholars call this false equivalency. It means that when you find a mountain to expose in one person or party, you have to pick a molehill on the other side and make it into a mountain to avoid being accused of bias. The built-up molehills also have large benefits: increased coverage on the evening news, millions of retweets, and more talk-show fodder. When the mountains and molehills all look the same, campaigns and governments devote too little time and energy debating the issues that matter most to our people. Even when we try to do that, we’re often drowned out by the passion of the day. There’s a real cost to this. It breeds more frustration, polarization, paralysis, bad decisions, and missed opportunities. But with no incentive to actually accomplish something, more and more politicians just go with the flow, fanning the flames of anger and resentment, when they should be acting as the fire brigade. Everybody knows it’s wrong, but the immediate rewards are so great we stagger on, just assuming that our Constitution, our public institutions, and the rule of law can endure each new assault without doing permanent damage to our freedoms and way of life.

He turns to her, his lethal blue eyes reduced to a squint. “Kathy.” “Lester. Be brief.” “I have the votes in the House,” he says. “The House is wrapped up like a bow. Is that brief enough?” One of the things she has learned over the years is the art of not responding too quickly. It buys you time and makes you seem more deliberative.

It's hard to be humble when they play a song for you every time you enter the room, when the world financial markets hang on your every word, and when you command the worlds greatest military arsenal, but if you need to knock yourself down a few pegs, try checking your stool for blood.