The Man Who Should Be King
When I tell people I'm a neo-monarchist, the usual response is to question my motives: “Oh, so you wish you were king?” No, I don’t actually (jester, perhaps, but certainly not king).
It’s an ugly side effect of democracy: the assumption everyone must be grubbing after power, stemming from our being taught, falsely, that in a democracy all have equal chance of acquiring power. The response also reflects how democracies (must?) propagate the repulsive notion there is no difference between kings and tyrants. Very few people in democracies truly wish to be kings, but many, if not most, desire to be tyrants.
But it is entirely legitimate to ask who, if we were to have monarchy, should be king. Because the answer is by no means obvious. As I little need to remind my readers, idiots, frauds, and fools surround us on all sides. Given the current putrid state of politics, academia, and the arts, it can be safely assumed anyone presently in any of those fields is automatically suspect, and should be disqualified. Our businessmen are little better: the honest ones lack the imagination to be king, and would, by nature and habit, at the very least impose some form of bureaucratic tyranny.
After considerable thought, it occurred to me there was a man, intelligent, honest, traditional and conservative by disposition, yet at the same time innovative and adept at calculating and taking risks. A man at ease with all classes and types of people, literally from the lowliest of laborer to landed gentry. He is thoroughbred horse trainer Richard Mandella. Son of a blacksmith, elected to the NTRA Hall of Fame in 2001, winner of four races in the 2003 Breeders Cup, his most recent success training the Tin Man, winner of last Saturdays Grade I Arlington Million, Richard Mandella is the man who should be king.
It’s an ugly side effect of democracy: the assumption everyone must be grubbing after power, stemming from our being taught, falsely, that in a democracy all have equal chance of acquiring power. The response also reflects how democracies (must?) propagate the repulsive notion there is no difference between kings and tyrants. Very few people in democracies truly wish to be kings, but many, if not most, desire to be tyrants.
But it is entirely legitimate to ask who, if we were to have monarchy, should be king. Because the answer is by no means obvious. As I little need to remind my readers, idiots, frauds, and fools surround us on all sides. Given the current putrid state of politics, academia, and the arts, it can be safely assumed anyone presently in any of those fields is automatically suspect, and should be disqualified. Our businessmen are little better: the honest ones lack the imagination to be king, and would, by nature and habit, at the very least impose some form of bureaucratic tyranny.
After considerable thought, it occurred to me there was a man, intelligent, honest, traditional and conservative by disposition, yet at the same time innovative and adept at calculating and taking risks. A man at ease with all classes and types of people, literally from the lowliest of laborer to landed gentry. He is thoroughbred horse trainer Richard Mandella. Son of a blacksmith, elected to the NTRA Hall of Fame in 2001, winner of four races in the 2003 Breeders Cup, his most recent success training the Tin Man, winner of last Saturdays Grade I Arlington Million, Richard Mandella is the man who should be king.
There is the added benefit that our King Richard I would reference, by name, England's King Richard I, the Lionheart (although presumably he wouldn't adopt French as the royal tongue).
ReplyDeleteTrue.
ReplyDeleteI defy democratists to provide an example of someone electable who would make a better leader.
Have you read Leftism Revisted? It's an outstanding history that converted me to monarchism.
ReplyDelete"Outstanding men, with a certain pride in their experience or their knowledge, are not likely to admire democracy, for it cannot distinguish between the various dgrees of knowledge, is indifferent towards truth, and takes its stand on the basis of quantity and biological age rather than quality. Indeed, it would be difficult to find in Europe more than a handful of truly outstanding thinkers--and not a single giant--who believed or believes in democracy."
--Leftism Revisited
No, but I've been meaning to for some time, ever since I read the quote from it:
ReplyDelete"For the average person, all problems date to World War II; for the more informed, to World War I; for the genuine historian, to the French Revolution."
That's a stellar quote. The whole book is filled with gems like that. Highly recommended.
ReplyDeleteRecommended tonic: "The Napoleon of Notting Hill," by Chesterton. This novel, written in 1904 and set in 1984, is based on the premise, quoting from pg. 31: "We want one man at the head of our State, not because he is brilliant or virtuous, but because is one man and not a chattering crowd. . . The King of England is chosen like a juryman upon an official rotation list. Beyond that the whole system is quietly despotic, and we have nnot found it raise a murmer." Orwell's "1984" was written as a response to Chesterton's prophecy that in 80 years: "the people had cheated the prophets of the twentienth century. When the curtain goes up on this story, eighty years after the present date, London is almost exactly like what it is now."
ReplyDeleteI'll add that to my ever expanding reading list, Mr. Shy. I've read essays by Chesterton but none of his novels. (I would argue Mandella has demonstrated himself to be both brilliant and virtuous)...
ReplyDeleteAnd add to his list of qualifications that he knows a thing or two about good breeding, very important in royalty.
ReplyDelete