Stranger in a Strange Land

empire of many traditions . . . Douglas, who really can't stomach assassination? Or do you want to toss him out of office (we can, you know, tomorrow-just by double-crossing him on the deal I've led him to expect-toss him out and thereby put in a Secretary General from a land where life has always been cheap and political assassination a venerable tradition? If you do this, Ben-tell me what happens to the next snoopy newsman who is careless enough to walk down a dark alley?"
                Caxton didn't answer.
                "As I said, the S.S. is just a tool. Men are always for hire who like dirty work. How dirty will that work become if you nudge Douglas out of his majority?"
                "Jubal, are you telling me that I ought not to criticize the administration? When they're wrong? When I know they're wrong?"
                "Nope. Gadflies such as yourself are utterly necessary. Nor am I opposed to 'turning the rascals out'-it's usually the soundest rule of politics. But it's well to take a look at what new rascals you are going to get before you jump at any chance to turn your present rascals out. Democracy is a poor system of government at best; the only thing that can honestly be said in its favor is that it is about eight times as good as any other method the human race has ever tried. Democracy's worst faults is that its leaders are likely to reflect the faults and virtues of their constituents-a depressingly low level, but what else can you expect? So take a look at Douglas and ponder that, in his ignorance, stupidity, and self-seeking, he much resembles his fellow Americans, including you and me . . . and that in fact he is a notch or two above the average. Then take a look at the man who will replace him if his government topples."
                "There's precious little choice."
                "There's always a choice! This one is a choice between 'bad' and 'worse'-which is a difference much more poignant than that between 'good' and 'better.'"
                "Well, Jubal? What do you expect me to do?"
                "Nothing," Harshaw answered. "Because I intend to run this show myself. Or almost nothing. I expect you to refrain from chewing out Joe Douglas over this coming settlement in that daily poop you write-maybe even praise him a little for 'statesmanlike restraint-'"
                "You're making me vomit!"
                "Not in the grass, please. Use your hat. -because I'm going to tell you ahead of time what I'm going to do, and why, and why Joe Douglas is going to agree to it. The first principle in riding a tiger is to hang on tight to its ears."
                "Quit being pompous. What's the deal?"
                "Quit being obtuse and listen. If this boy were a penniless nobody, there would be no problem. But he has the misfortune to be indisputably the heir to more wealth than Croesus ever dreamed of . . . plus a highly disputable claim to political power even greater through a politico-judicial precedent unparalleled in pure jug-headedness since the time Secretary Fall was convicted of receiving a bribe that Doheny was acquitted of having given him."
                "Yes, but-"
                "I have the floor. As I told Jill, I have no slightest interest in 'True Prince' nonsense. Nor do I regard all that wealth as 'his'; he didn't produce a shilling of it. Even if he had earned it himself-impossible at his age -'property' is not the natural and obvious and inevitable concept that most people think it is."
                "Come again?"
                "Ownership, of anything, is an extremely sophisticated abstraction, a mystical relationship, truly. God knows our legal theorists make this mystery complicated enough-but I didn't begin to see how subtle it was until I got the Martian slant on it. Martians don't have property. They don't own anything . . . not even their own bodies."
                "Wait a minute, Jubal. Even animals have property. And the Martians aren't animals; they're a highly developed civilization, with great cities and all sorts of things."
                "Yes. 'Foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests.' And nobody understands a property line and the 'meus-et-tuus' involved better than a watch dog. But not Martians. Unless you regard an undistributed joint ownership of everything by a few