tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4530463554584181774.post5847749017292792547..comments2023-05-17T07:53:18.995-04:00Comments on Sycamore Three: "If you aren't for us you're against us"Robert Heidhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07622336432907413984noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4530463554584181774.post-41300796500548111722015-07-06T12:26:12.881-04:002015-07-06T12:26:12.881-04:00I don't exactly remember these comments of his...I don't exactly remember these comments of his but I read this book several years ago and lent it to someone...<br /><br />Others I have read have written of Eric Hoffer's book on the True Believer. It's a pyschological phenomenon with certain people that whatever they are into they are into 110%. They tend to go through violent swings from one "abstraction" to the next, to use Wendell's terminology. I think in many ways I fit the profile of the True Believer...I've never read Hoffer's book but I think I know the True Believer "type."<br /><br />Having said that, I don't think that True Believers are a majority of the people out there, signing on to political movements. By definition, a "True Believer" would have to be a minority view, a small group, a subset of the larger set. Most people, in particular political leaders and men with governing responsibility, tend not to be True Believers. Particularly in America, I think people tend to go with "what works."<br /><br />American politics tends to gravitate toward a common center. Extremism doesn't play well here. The Constitution, with its onerous requirements for amending itself, as well as the system of checks and balances, make comprehensive, sweeping reform of anything difficult to get done. Purists of the Right, Left or Libertarian wings of politics are ever frustrated with this but that's the way things work.<br /><br />I think that most people realize the complexity of daily life and seek to live decently without knowing all the answers. Wendell seems to be saying that the True Believer defines the outlook of most people, but I don't think that's true. Given the forces of intertia, its' more likely for our people to overlook big problems or abject evil in the name of pragmatism than to be fanatically dedicated to some abstract cause.Ben Carmackhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15689868508463357958noreply@blogger.com