Hardscrabble Road(80)

“And now here you are. I’m glad you came. I thought you might provide a little insight where I need it. Did you hear any of the news about the screeching woman at all? She came to the police and gave them a list of all the people she thought had motive, means, and opportunity to kill her husband.”

“How does she know they had opportunity?”

“Good question. I expect that she’s just guessing. But the thing is, there’s the list, and she’s going on television to announce it, and now we’re stuck taking the list seriously. But it’s an odd list. And there are a number of very odd people on it.”

“Like who?”

Gregor took a folded-up copy of the list from the breast pocket of his jacket and handed it over. “Look at the fourth from the top.”

Tibor counted down four, and blinked. Then he counted down four again, although why that mattered, Gregor didn’t know. Tibor put the list flat down on the table and sat back.

“Well,” he said.

“Exactly,” Gregor said.

“Dr. Richard Alden Tyler,” Tibor said.

“I think people call him Jig.”

Tibor brushed this away. “Tcha, Krekor, what can I say? With some people it might only be a nickname, but with him it is an affectation. Like that man in England, who gave up his title so he could sit in the House of Commons and pretend to be a member of the working classes.”

“Tony Benn.”

“That’s right. Lord Anthony Wedgwood Benn. Or Anthony Wedgwood Benn, Lord Stansgate. Or something. I am sorry, Krekor, but my memory is fuzzy. In both cases, it is an affectation. In Dr. Tyler’s case it is more than an affectation. It is a joke.”

“You don’t think Jig Tyler really believes the things he says politically?”

“I think that Dr. Tyler believes that the world is full of people so stupid they can be hypnotized by an advertising jingle,” Tibor said. “He says he is a socialist, but that is not the case. He is not a socialist. He is a Platonist.”

“That’s a political party?”

“It’s a political attitude,” Tibor said. “The world should be ruled by philosopher-kings, because they are so much wiser than the rest of us, and they will make good decisions for us because we cannot make good decisions for ourselves. This is the real political divide in the world, Krekor. It’s not between conservatives and liberals or between left and right or between Republican and Democrat or between capitalist and socialist. The real political divide in the world is between the people who think that if you make a decision they think is stupid, you must be too stupid to make decisions, and the people who think that every man has a right to make his own decisions about his own life. The second kind of people understand that we are not free to make decisions unless we are free to make bad ones. It’s like seat belts.”

The waitress was back with Gregor’s sandwich and fries and a coffee cup for Tibor. The sandwich was the size of a small Tiger shark and just as thick. When they said big meat in this place, they meant it. They both sat back while the waitress returned to the counter for the coffeepot. Then Tibor began putting sugar and milk into his coffee. He used a lot of both. Gregor thought he was going to end up with a coffee milk shake, and more milk than coffee.

“Seat belts,” Gregor said helpfully.

“Yes,” Tibor said. “Seat belts. It is a very stupid thing to ride in a car without seat belts. There is nothing to be said for deciding not to do it that would hold weight with any rational person. This is a fact, yes? But it is also a fact that some people do not like to wear seat belts, and won’t wear them. So…is it a good thing to pass laws to require you to wear them, or not?”

“We did pass a law to require us to wear them.”

“Yes, yes, Krekor, we did. But why? Because those of us who have come to the conclusion that not to wear seat belts is stupid have no respect for the people who came to the opposite conclusion. We don’t need to treat them like adults who have a right to make their own decisions. We instead treat them like children who have to be forced for their own good. That’s the key, Krekor. Laws should never be passed to save people from themselves. When you begin to do that, you threaten to bring democracy to an end.”

“You want to repeal the seat belt laws,” Gregor said, not sure he was understanding this.

“The seat belt laws are trivial, Krekor, the principle is not. Democracy rests on the principle that ordinary men and women are fully competent to know their own best interests and make their own decisions about their own affairs. When we pass laws against things people do that hurt only themselves, we say that democracy has failed. It didn’t work. Ordinary men and women do not know what’s good for them, so we have to have smarter, more rational people force them to live in a sensible way. Seat belt laws. The drug war. Laws against pornography in print and on the screen. Laws against giving birth control to unmarried people. These proposals to tax people who are too fat or who won’t exercise or who insist on eating food like that,” Tibor looked dubiously at Gregor’s sandwich, “rather than green salads with low-fat dressing. And Dr. Richard Alden Tyler, who would legislate those things and a great deal more.”