nobis in arto et ingloriosus labor

[ricardienne]

I usually get mild enjoyment from the Op-Eds of Gail Collins (though can we talk about the fact that the two regular women columnists on the New York Times Opinion page are there for the explicitly fluff, light-hearted commentary columns?) But I quite like this quote from her most recent:

If we lived in a democracy full of heroic candidates in evenly matched battles, there’d be no challenge to being an energized voter. Everybody would do it! As it is, one of our greatest civic virtues is the willingness to soldier on and participate in elections even when the contests are foregone conclusions or vaguely ridiculous.