usmbguest5318
Gold Member
Can the government function properly, can it move the country forward, when so little attention is paid to issues?
As your question that follows the one above implies, the issue isn't that "little attention" is paid to issues, but rather that the attention paid is inapt to the issues at hand. All the attention in the world amounts to naught if folks focus on immaterial aspects of the topic/issue. To wit, perusing some of the most heavily posted-in threads on USMB, one sees that overwhelming majority of comments don't actually offer substantive and soundly germane on the topic but rather offer a cacophony of tu quoque, red herring, straw man and other insipid thoughts. Discourse too often is suffused with rhetoric not reason.
Do we not think that many of our Best & Brightest are going to stay away from politics because of this trend?
There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."
-- Isaac Asimov
-- Isaac Asimov
Plenty of the best and brightest eschew high government service. I mean really...How many U.S. Nobel laureates have held top level positions as the heads of key government organizations or as members of Congress? Are any U.S. science or economics laureates heading any government agencies? What Rhodes or Fulbright scholars have held high elected or appointed office? [1]
Note:
- The Rhodes Scholars whom I'm aware of and who have held high government service roles are: Bill Bradley, Bill Clinton, George Stephanopoulos, Dean Rusk, Bill Fulbright, Strobe Talbot, Cory Booker, Gen. Wes Clark, and Bobby Jindal.
There may be a Nobel laureate or two holding or who held high elected/appointed office, but none come to mind.