FW de Klerk, pink peeling face bloated as if by cortisone, funereal smile stretched under dull eyes,

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FW de Klerk, pink peeling face bloated as if by cortisone, funereal smile stretched under dull eyes, his political how to make a paper gun that shoots ideas as obsolete as a typewriter, his opinion blighted by the ridicule of opponents and his opponents are everywhere and everybody his memory distorted by his misapprehensions and his reputation finally tarnished by extra-marital dalliance, will have what he has desired above all else: he will leave a legacy. how to make a paper gun that shoots Legacy in the mind of the career politician means place in history. And a place in history FW de Klerk will have and it will be that of a rare enough political bird, and though he represents a well-developed example of a certain category, he certainly is not without how to make a paper gun that shoots company in his corner of history. There future historians will find him with a coterie of some of history s most flamboyant figures. Montezuma, the Aztec king, will be there, as will Rehoboam how to make a paper gun that shoots the grandson of ancient Israel s great king David, how to make a paper gun that shoots as will France s Sun King Louis XIV and Phillip II of Spain, a lineage of Renaissance popes and England s Farmer George the Third.
What distinguishes these men; why are they in that particular corral of history? They were leaders sure, as were thousands of others, but they are remarkable for having devastated their countries and their people, not by one massive miscalculation, but in persisting in a course of action that was so foolish that historians are at a loss to explain the slow meltdown of mental processes.
Popular historian Barbara Tuchman (popular historians are the same as regular or academic historians except that they write readable prose) considers the effect in her pondering (as opposed to ponderous) work, The March of Folly . She beautifully describes the nature and mechanisms of folly, but concedes that she does not understand why the leaders in our list persisted in it. And persist in it, that they did.
Farmer George lost America how to make a paper gun that shoots forever for England, Louis expelled the Huguenots and thus impoverished his country and then vaingloriously waged unnecessary wars which bankrupted France and shoved the country over the precipice towards revolution, popes Sixtus IV to Clement VII through their perversions and arrogance triggered the Reformation which split the church and eventually led to it forever losing its pre-eminent position in the world, but only two of the leaders in the list Montezuma and FW de Klerk rushed from heights how to make a paper gun that shoots of enormous power to prostrate themselves and their people at the feet of a ruthless but weak and outmanoeuvred how to make a paper gun that shoots foe.
Montezuma was the mighty leader of the Aztecs, a people so ruthless they habitually sacrificed people in an effort to cajole some goodwill from their imaginary gods. They were safely ensconced in the natural fortresses of the high mountains how to make a paper gun that shoots and were a prosperous lot. There was no reason to even contemplate a radical change in position or fortune. They had every reason to feel safe behind the aggressive bulk of a standing army exceeding six hundred thousand men. Then, at the height of their power, one Hernán Cortés came calling. He d sailed from the Old to the New World, not with an armada, but with a few dainty wooden ships containing 600 men, seventeen horses and 17 small cannons in all.
Cortés was a conquistador, a Spanish invader and fortune seeker. He was utterly ruthless, decisive and fearless. And outmanned. His enemy had the decisive advantage of 1,000 men under arms for every one of Cortés s adventurers. Montezuma could have summoned his cooks to do his fighting and still overwhelmed how to make a paper gun that shoots Cortés and his avaricious band. This he did not do. What he in fact did was to meekly submit to the conquistador, thereby cracking the door to his country for the thin edge of the wedge. Soon he was deposed and his people subjugated under the unsympathetic heel of Catholic Spain.
This stunning capitulation still renders historians nonplussed. Tuchman has a tentative stab at an answer, but if she is not convincing it is because she is not convinced. She timidly ascribes Montezuma how to make a paper gun that shoots s m