Sorry for the dearth of posting the last couple of days.  I’m grading.  For any academic who has faced it, you know how diverting it can be; and for those who do not have to do it, trust me, it is a horrible time sink.

      So, I will simply offer here something from Mencius to keep in mind, as the US media is fixated on the ebb and flow of the presidential campaign and the peccadilloes of the ex-governor of New York and the comings and goings of other big-shot politicos:

Mencius said: "The people are the
most precious of all things.  Next come the gods of soil and grain.
The sovereign matters least."   (261)