Quote of the Day for Friday, January 21st, 2011:
Victor David Hanson, writing yesterday for National Review Online, on when sermonizing on real or imagined global issues trumps the exercise of competence for local officials – or camouflages its absence:
Dupnik is a good example of the increasingly common bad habit of local politicians to resort to cosmic sermonizing when more mundane challenges go unaddressed. In Dupnik’s case, it is hard to monitor all the nuts like Loughner in the sheriff’s department files to ensure they don’t get guns and bullets and pop up at political events, but apparently far easier to deflect subsequent responsibility by sounding off on political issues.
I really didn’t intend to keep bringing up this Tucson fiasco, but Hanson makes some great points in this short article using this and other examples, and I love the “cosmic sermonizing” imagery – I just had to quote it.