The Price Good Men Pay

I was browsing the Internet the other day and came across this famous adage of Plato's:

The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.

What struck me about it this time around was not so much the moral its intention was to communicate, as it was the reason the adage became necessary in the first place. That is, it struck me that even then, circa 400 BC, in what we are typically taught was the highly developed Hellenic political culture, in Athens, the most politically refined of all that culture's cities, good men, the best men, would rather do something else than involve themselves in its politics. Instead, they had to be shamed into service.

This reinforced my long-held belief that, as a rule, the very best men in any society are simply not interested in its politics, and that, as a result, we should remain always suspicious of the motivations and capabilities of those who are. Survey, in your mind, the current American political landscape and tell me that isn't true.