Dear Foxy,

To put it in terms of US politics, and I am a citizen of that country. In my opinion the most benevolent and moral president the US has had in recent years is Jimmmy Carter. However, those dirty dogs, Bill Clinton and Donald Trump, understood how to use power much better than Jimmy Carter.

Dear David F.,

I don't know that much about former US President
Jimmy Carter. I haven't heard anything bad said
about him by my American friends. And I agree he was
nothing like Bill Clinton and certainly nothing like Donald
Trump.

Is Mise,

I quoted it exactly as given on the web.

As for it being meaningless to you?
That is something over which I have no control.
I think most people will get the meaning.

Dear Foxy,

"The Outlier" is a biography of Jimmy Carter published last year. I think he was a wonderful man, and he did the right thing in terms of decency and morality. I think there was nothing bad said about him because an honest person could say nothing bad about him. I wish he had been more successful in getting the US to follow his essential goodness.

Foxy
‘…. one young girl or boy may growup to be our Nation’s first head of state”

And here’s me thinking that the Earl of Hopetoun was the first, representing Queen Victoria.

Machiavelli was a bit wordy- but I found his comparison of Western and Eastern political structures instructive. As David F said Machiavelli appears to have sent a letter to The Prince knowing him as a good man (what ever that meant to Machiavelli) in desperation of his vision of the future. But at the date of his death 1527 things were very different- so one should be careful in making modern comparisons. Perhaps David F's comment on Machiavelli's possible republicanism of the 1500's was the 'missing link' in the fallacious development of liberalism (negative freedom as opposed to virtue based structure) by John Locke in the 1660's, and culminating in The Terror of the 1790's, followed by Dostoevskian 1860's, and the 1917 revolution.

Patrick Deneen talks about the 500 year journey of Liberalism.

I suppose that even the Magna Carta of 1215 and Shang Yang could be considered to be elements of corrupting liberal thought- though admittedly Roman Law seems to have had a principle of equality before the dark ages. Hellenistic culture seemed to focus on virtue- positive freedom rather than liberalism- negative freedom.

Nietzsche touched on the idea that everyone isn't equal and that can be a good thing for everyone- those that can strive will- and if you hobble every horse you won't bring in the crop- and everyone will starve.

I said that Machiavelli was wordy...

In my view-
In a sense you could say that Nietzsche is to civilization what Socrates is to truth.

Utopia's

"Among those who dislike oppression are many who like to oppress." Napoleon

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/made-by-history/wp/2017/10/22/how-jimmy-carter-lost-iran/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationalization_of_the_Iranian_oil_industry
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Front_(Iran)