“It is in middles that extremes clash, where ambiguity restlessly rules.” — John Updike

In the full range and breadth of society, there are many claimants to power. None have proved enduring. The church, the nobility, and all the rest have had their time in the sun and it has faded away. Today’s power nodules are (1) the mass media; (2) politicians (for a very temporary time); and (3) the moneyed class, particularly as it influences the political class.

For the Average Joe, the mass media is the place to climb onto if you want a spot in the sun. Granted, you will only be one of many. But the same applies to (2) and (3) — they only have strength in numbers.

The mass media influences minds through entertainment, primarily. It didn’t used to be so. Even a hundred and fifty years ago, the newspaper was the primary means of mind-manipulation. It was counted as one of the “Estates.” But something happened. Movies got invented, and then television — and the writers had real power for the first time in a long time.

Generally speaking, authors can only affect the intelligent. But with mass media, this slides downward to encompass the great blob of society.

Television in particular is an ideal medium for ramming your thoughts down someone else’s throat and not getting a violent regurgitation.

As for (2) and (3), they’re more obvious. If the politicians make the laws, they (as a group) hold considerable power. But they are limited in what they can do. Constitutions and social conventions bind them effectively to the post. The moneyed class is more insidious, but its influence is equally apparent: it funds the elections, which broadcasts the TV commercials, which reach a mass audience. In exchange for cash, they get low tax rates and special programs enacted on their behalf, without regard to what the majority wants. (In the United States, there has been a decades-long push for a public health care system with majority support, for example, but the rich apparently don’t like it because the Republicans keep derailing it.)

So that raises the question, who should wield power and for what duration?

I would boil the answer down to two groups of men: Intelligent tough guys and creative artists.

The creatively violent and the violently creative.

Why these two groups? Because they suit my tastes, no other reason. The intelligent tough guys, like Stalin and Napoleon, are naturally harnessed to power. They thrive in it. The creative artists deserve it at least as much. They provide the bulk of the world’s funtime, and all of its serious thought. What better group than that to seize the reins of power?

It goes without saying that the intelligent tough guys would eat the creative artists for breakfast, so institutional protections would have to be enacted to protect the latter from the former. It is not hard to imagine a society, though, that balances the edge of the sword with the weight of the keyboard. In the same way that knights and priests were natural counterbalances in medieval Europe, the tough and the artists have interests in common. The tough can act as the fist of the creative. The creative can justify the tough, the way Chinese philosophers tamed and neutralized the Emperors.

These two groups have a natural claim to power. Let’s see what they do when they get it.