Blue Agave and Political Thought

Once a week I go to Blue Agave for lunch. I take a book or the newspaper with me to occupy my mind, such as it is, while I drink three rather good and tall margaritas and eat some rather ordinary Mexican food.

Blue Agave, by the way, advertises they have every brand of tequila distilled in Agave, Mexico. You have to like that even if you are not an aficionado of tequila. The option is always there should you decide to broaden your horizons.

I took Tocqueville's Democracy in America with me to read today. I think I mentioned during the holidays that I was about to undertake a structured rereading of the canon of western political thought and continue many steps beyond. My intent was to take things in historical sequence, but, being the disorganized soul I am, I started reading Democracy in America first.

I won't try to justify amending my plan by starting with Tocqueville. I read Marx last year as a preliminary to the project. That hardly fits either.

The idea is to put everything to skeptical Cartesian doubt. Nothing will be beyond doubt, censure, or approbation. That is, at least as it is within my powers to overcome my prejudices, stupidity, vanity, and isolation.

This project captured my imagination five years ago. The sheer messiness of my life and my natural indolence has prevented me from pursuing it.

My intuition leads me to think Tocqueville was the good choice with which to begin. It will be a long time before I know whether the intuition is justified.