An apathetic public is the surest guarantee

I really must find the ibrary book I so diligently hand copied and then typed these notes from so many years ago.

Competition at election time between the parties turns about as much on issues concerning the average person as competition between General Motors and Ford turns on quality and price. In both cases preserving the shared monopoly by excluding dangerous competitors is more important to the monopolies than the exact share of the market held by each party or firm.

An apathetic public is the surest guarantee that office holders can continue to profit in peace from their alliance with those who screw the public. Loss of faith can lead, not to more skeptical and self-reliant political beliefs, but to falling for the next persuasive pitchman.

Paranoia is the clay from which our great novelist Thomas Pynchon fashioned his art ... Persuasive though it is, the paranoid interpretation is ultimately innocent, for it assumes that the evil doers must meet in order to serve each others interests. History suggests otherwise. The baron on this side of the river has always justified the tribute he levied on his people as needed to defend them against the enemy across the river, and yet--though each enemy was necessary to preserve the others' prosperity--no evidence exists that the two barons had to meet in midstream to orchestrate their cover stories.