An essay on Self Delusion

Chutzpa. That's really the only word that sufficiently describes how someone like former Illinois governor Rod blagojevich can compare himself to great men like Martin Luther King Jr. and Nelson Mandela.

Granted, we all remember the time Mr. Mandela tried to sell his seat in the prison cafeteria to the highest bidder, or the time Dr. King angled for a little quid pro quo for the privilege to march next to him in Alabama. Still, it defies logic when an embattled leader can become so self-deluded as to believe, let alone vocalize the idea that they are somehow akin to great leaders of the past. Its not just Blugoyavich. Just weeks ago, President Bush attempted to equate his now commonly derided terms in office to those of Abraham Lincoln.

Aside from the distastefulness of such self aggrandizement, it does little for their credibility to attempt to garner sympathy by claiming kinship to history's strongest leaders.

When threatened, a skunk will often do a series of acrobatic handstands before spraying its antagonizer with its nauseating stench. With politicians, the acrobatics come second.

Maybe it is simpler than that. Maybe all politicians have a need for their egos to be assuaged of guilt for bad decisions by rationalization. President Nixon claimed victimhood during his ordeal, and perhaps at the time his words rang true to his supporters. I imagine in the same way, Blugoyavich and Bush don't seem so deluded to those who who still idolize them.

It may be best to keep one thing in mind through all of this: Nelson Mandela, Dr. King, and Abraham Lincoln did not need to rhetorically equate themselves to Socrates, Mahatmas Gandhi, and Moses.

Great leaders don't need to argue they are great. Claiming a legacy through rhetoric does not make it true, and insisting as Joseph Stalin did, that "History will absolve" him, did not, in fact, make it so.