Ten Things I Know Now I Didn’t Know in 2016

Ten Things I Know Now I Didn’t Know in 2016 November 3, 2020

  1. The Whig project (or classical liberal project, if you prefer) of endless human perfectibility is over.
  2. Original sin is a thing and has to be taken into account, even by Wesleyan-Arminians like me.
  3. Most gestures are empty gestures.
  4. Voting might be a gesture.
  5. Elite culture is broken. (Non-elite culture is broken, too, but I already knew that.)
  6. The only way out is through.
  7. Conversely, sometimes the only way through is out.
  8. Almost everything can be endured, but you never know which part can’t be endured until you have to endure it.
  9. Democracy is a means, not an end.
  10. Even the Cubs can’t solve everything overnight.

Image: New York Public Library on Unsplash – 1938. Campaign posters in garage window, just before the primary. Waco, Texas


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