El nombre de la rosa.

Novela histórica de misterio ambientada en el ambiente religioso del siglo XIV que se convirtió rápidamente en un best seller internacional a principios de los años ochenta y acabó siendo llevada al cine por el director francés Jean-Jacques Annaud. Narra la investigación de una misteriosa cadena de crímenes que se suceden en una abadía de los Alpes italianos. Pronto se convirtió en una novela de culto en la que muchos creyeron ver referencias a Jorge Luis Borges, Arthur Conan Doyle o incluso Guillermo de Ockham. En definitiva, que se trata de una de esas novelas que hace ya bastantes años que he querido leer y jamás me había puesto a hacerlo hasta ahora.

Ficha técnica:
Título: El nombre de la rosa.
Autor: Umberto Eco.
Editorial: Debolsillo.
Edición: Séptima edición en formato de bolsillo, Barcelona, octubre 2006 (1980).
Páginas: 781.
ISBN: 84-9759-258-1

Comparing brain versus computer: parallel versus serial.

Von Neumann's summary of the comparison between the human brain and the computer contains, astonishingly enough, a few insights that still apply to today's technology:

First: in terms of the number of actions that can be performed by active organs of the same total size (defined by volume or by energy dissipation) in the same interval, the natural componentry is a factor 10⁴ ahead of the artificial one. This is the quotient of the two factors obtained above, i.e. of 10⁸ to 10⁹ by 10⁴ to 10⁵.

Second: the same factors show that the natural componentry favors automata with more, but slower, organs, while the artificial one favors the reverse arrangement of fewer, but faster, organs. Hence it is to be expected that an efficiently organized large natural automation (like the human nervous system) will tend to pick up as many logical (or informational) items as possible simultaneously, and process them simultaneously, while an efficiently organized large artificial automaton (like a large modern computing machine) will be more likely to do things successively —one thing at a time, or at any rate not so many things at a time. That is, large and efficient natural automata are likely to be highly parallel, while large and efficient artificial automata will tend to be less so, and rather to be serial. (...)

Third: it should be noted, however, that parallel and serial operation are not unrestrictedly substitutable for each other —as would be required to make the first remark above completely valid, with its simple scheme of dividing the size-advantage factor by the speed-disadvantage factor in order to get a single (efficiency) "figure of merit." More specifically, not everything serial can be immediately paralleled —certain operations can only be performed after certain others, and not simultaneously with them (i.e. they must use the results of the latter). In such a case, the transition from a serial scheme to a parallel one may be impossible, or it may be possible but only concurrently with a change in the logical approach and organization of the procedure. Conversely, the desire to serialize a parallel procedure may impose new requirements on the automaton. Specifically, it will almost always create new memory requirements, since the results of the operations that are performed first must be stored while the operations that come after these are performed. Hence the logical approach and structure in natural automata may be expected to differ widely from those in artificial automata. Also, it is likely that the memory requirements of the latter will turn out to be systematically more severe than those of the former.

(von Neumann: pp. 50-52)

It speaks for the excelence of von Neumann's work that at least parts of it are ust as relevant today as they were back in 1956, in spite of all the changes that took place in a field that's as dynamic as this. Specifically, those reflections about parallel versus serialized computing are still plenty relevant.

The limits of the brain.

Paul and Patricia Churchland synthesize pretty well in the foreword the main thesis put forward by John von Neumann in this book:

Should we simply press past the obvious limitations of biological systems (limitations mostly of speed and reliability) and pursue the dazzling potential of electronic systems, systems that can, in principle and even with a von Neumann architecture, implement or simulate any possible computational activities? Or should we attempt instead, for whatever reasons, to mimic the computational organization displayed in the brains of insects, fishes, birds, and mammals? And what organization is that, anyway? Is it importantly or interestingly different from what goes on in our artificial machines?

Here, the reader may be surprised to discover, John von Neumann weighs in with a prescient, powerful, and decidedly nonclassical answer. He spends the first half of the book leading the reader stepwise through the classical conceptions for which he is so famously responsible, and as he turns finally to address the brain, he hazards the initial conclusion that "its functioning is prima facie digital." But this initial take on the neuronal data is also prima facie procrustean, a fact that von Neumann acknowledges immediately and subsequently turns to pursue at length.

The first problem he notes is that the connections between neurons do not show the telltale "two lines in and one line out" configuration that classical and-gates and or-gates display. Though each cell typically projects exactly one output axon, as the classical take would require, each cell receives more than a hundred, even more than several thousand, inputs from many other neurons. This fact is not decisive —there are, for example, multivalent logics. But it does give him pause.

The plot thickens as von Neumann pursues a point-by-point comparison between the fundamental dimensions of the brain's "basic active organs" (presumably, the neurons) and the computer's "basic active organs" (the various logic gates). Spatially, he observes, neurons have the advantage of being at least 10² times smaller than their presumptive electronic counterparts. (At the time, this estimate was exactly right, but with the unforeseen advent of photo-etched microchips, this size advantage has simply disappeared, at least where two-dimensional sheets are concerned. We can forgive von Neumann this one.)

More important, neurons have a major disadvantage where the speed of their operations is concerned. Neurons are, he estimates, perhaps 10⁵ times slower than vacuum tubes or transistors in the time required to complete a basic logical operation. Here he is portentously correct, in ways about to emerge. If anything, he underestimates the neuron's very considerable disadvantage. If we assume that a neuron can have a "clock frequency" of no better than roughly 10² Hz, then the clock frequencies of almost 1,000 MHz (that is, 10⁹ basic operations per second) now displayed in the most recent generation of desktop machines push the neuron's disadvantage closer to a factor of 10⁷. The conclusion is inescapable. If the brain is a digital computer with a von Neumann architecture, it is doomed to be a computational tortoise by comparison.

Additionally, the accuracy with which the biological brain can represent any variable is also many orders od magnitude below the accuracies available to a digital computer. Computers, von Neumann observes, can easily use and manipulate eight, ten, or twelve decimal places of representation, while the neuron's presumed mode of representation —the frequency of the spike train it sends down its axon— appears limited to a representational accuracy of at most two decimal places (specifically, plus or minus perhaps 1 percent of a frequency maximum of roughly 100 Hz). This is troubling because, in the course of any computation that involves a great many steps, small errors of representation in the early steps regularly accumulate into larger errors at the closing steps. Worse, he adds, for many important classes of computation, even tiny errors in the early steps get exponentially amplified in subsequent steps, which inevitably leads to wildly inaccurate final outputs. Thus, if the brain is a digital computer with only two decimal places of representational accuracy, it is doomed to be a computational dunce.

Conjointly, these two severe limitations —one on speed, and the other on accuracy— drive von Neumann to the conclusion that whatever computational regime the brain is using, it must be one that somehow involves a minimum of what he calls "logical depth". That is, whatever the brain is doing, it cannot be sequentially performing thousands upon thousands of sequentially orchestrated computational steps, as in the super-high frequency, recursive activity of a digital machine's central processor. Given the slowness of its neuronal activities, there isn't enough time for the brain to complete any but the most trivial of computations. And given the low accuracy of its typical representations, it would be computationally incompetent even if it did have enough time.

(Paul & Patricia Churchland: pp. XV - XVIII, foreword)

In other words, von Neumann asks himself the same questions that humans have been trying to answer for centuries now: is it possible to simulate the human brain? But how does the brain function? That's precisely what he reflects upon in this short book we are now discussing. If anything, what makes this attempt different is the fact that we know far more about the human body and also that we have developed a methodology that allows us to reap the fruits of human knowledge in a manner that we could only dream of centuries ago: the scientific methodology. Of the two, this latter issue is perhaps the key, the engine behind the rapid succession of advances that we have accomplished in the last 100 years or so. In other words, unlike in the time of Aristotle, we now have a good reason to believe that our dream of building intelligent machines is within reach.

El Hobbit.

The Hobbit debe haber sido la segunda novela que leí en inglés en toda mi vida. Si no recuerdo mal, fue allá por 1990 ó 1991, poco después de leer Animal Farm, de George Orwell, que sin duda intimidaba menos. Y no es que cometiera el error tan frecuente de pensar que, puesto que era literatura fantástica, debiera estar dirigida al público lector infantil o juvenil y, por tanto, debiera ser fácil de leer, no. A esas alturas ya sabía distinguir entre literatura fantástica y aquella otra dirigida a los niños. Pero el caso es que ya había leído por entonces un buen número de libros de ensayo e imaginaba que, siendo capaz de leer obras de economía y política internacional en una lengua extranjera, tampoco tendría problema alguno con The Hobbit. La verdad es que, a pesar de los avisos de más de un amigo, no me equivoqué. La lectura fue moderadamente difícil, pero reconfortante.

Pues bien, muchos años después, me encuentro con este comic en la estantería de uno de mis hijos... y yo sigo sin leer el opus magnum de J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings. Se trata, por un lado, de que me da un poco de pereza cuando veo tamaño libro. Pero, fundamentalmente, el hecho es que la literatura fantástica no me va, la verdad sea dicha. Puedo tolerar la ciencia ficción con algunas condiciones —fundamentalmente, que no sea demasiado fantástica, que entre dentro de lo relativamente posible, aunque sea dentro de varios miles de años—, pero la fantasía me parece en demasiadas ocasiones... pues eso, excesivamente fantástica. Y es que en demasiadas ocasiones los autores parecen confundir fantasía con infantilismo, o al menos esa es la impresión que se lleva uno. Dicho esto, he de reconocer que Tolkien no es uno de esos autores.

En cualquier caso, esta novela gráfica de Charles Dixon y David Wenzel está bastante conseguida. Mantiene el espíritu del libro y tanto el dibujo como la tipografía casan bien con el contenido fantástico de la obra que nos narra las aventuras de Bilbo Bolsón. Se disfruta mucho y se lee en un par de sentadas.

Ficha técnica:
Título: El Hobbit.
Autor: Charles Dixon y David Wenzel, basado en la historia de J.R.R. Tolkien.
Editorial: Norma Editorial.
Edición: Barcelona, 1990.
Páginas: 134 páginas
ISBN: 84-8431-432-4

The Computer and the Brain.

A very short book, written for Yale's Silliman Lectures and published after the author's death, that can definitely be considered a part of the very foundations of Computer Science. In it, John von Neumann (yes, the father of the renowned von Neumann architecture upon which we built the whole edifice of modern computing) muses about the differences between machine and biological intelligence. Prominent neuroscientific thinkers Paul M. Churchland and Patricia S. Churchland provide a brief introduction to the book, which represents the final accomplishment of one of the greatest mathematicians of the twentieth century. John von Neumann concludes that the human brain operates, at least in part, in a digital manner, although instead of doing so in a sequential manner, it acts in what can only be considered a massively parallel form, thus predating our contemporary approach to these issues.

Technical description:
Title: The Computer and the Brain.
Author: John von Neumann.
Publisher: Yale Nota Bene/Yale University Press
Edition: Second edition, New York (USA), 2000 (1958).
Pages: 82 pages.
ISBN: 0-300-08473-0

Find it on Amazon (USA, UK).

The solar terminator.

Shame on me, but I had never heard of the solar terminator. Or, to put it a different way, every single time I heard the concept in a context other than SCSI cables I thought it was referring to Terminator, the character in the movies. I was obviously wrong, and I owe to Neal Stephenson that I learned a new tidbit of information today.

They are angling across the terminator -not the robotic assassin of moviedom, but the line between night and day through which our planet incessantly rotates.

(Stephenson: p. 740)

Cryptonomicon.

A 1999 novel by Neal Stephenson, one of the best examples of postcyberpunk literature, a mixture of science fiction and historical fiction with plenty of references to science, philosophy, history, religion and many other topics. In Cryptonomicon, Stephenson explores the exploits of the cryptographers who worked at Bletchley Park during World War II, linking it to the story of their descendants, who are trying to set up a data haven in the Pacific at the end of the 20th century. Nominated for the Hugo Award in 2000, it quickly became a cult among hackers and cypherpunks.

Technical description:
Title: Cryptonomicon.
Author: Neal Stephenson.
Publisher: Arrow Books.
Edition: First edition, reimpressed, London (UK), 2007 (1999).
Pages: 918 pages.
ISBN: 0-09-941067-2

Find it on Amazon (USA, UK).

El sabor agridulce de los recuerdos de posguerra.

La lectura de Todo Paracuellos (que, por cierto, se hace bien ligera) tiene unas consecuencias bien extrañas en el espíritu. Se trata de una de esas historias que dejan un cierto sabor agridulce en el paladar. Nos hace reír y llorar a ratos, mientras que en otros momentos no nos queda más remedio que bajar el libro y entregarnos a una apesadumbrada reflexión sobre el oscurantismo que se apoderó de nuestro país durante la inmediata posguerra. Los ojos de los niños son en realidad sobrecogedores en ocasiones. Limitados como estamos a transcribir únicamente el texto de los diálogos, seguramente no podré ni sabré transmitir la enorme carga de nostalgia, sufrimiento y amargura que encierran estas páginas. Basten unas pinceladas para que el lector pueda hacerse una somera idea. He aquí, por ejemplo, una conversación entre dos chavales del "hogar":

— Anoche mi padre me contó que se ha vuelto a casar con... otra mujer que yo no conozco... y tiene hijos con ella. Dos niñas y un niño.
— ¿Y esos también están en los hogares?
— No, esos no. Esos viven con mi padre y la mujer de mi padre en nuestra casa de Madrid. Mira, mejor... así cuando mi padre me saque tendré con quién jugar.

(Giménez: pp. 490-491)

Ni que decir tiene que el padre, pese a todas las promesas, nunca le saca del "hogar". Y nosotros lo sabemos de sobra, lo cual no hace sino añadir mayor tristeza al diálogo. El padre es un falangista sinvergüenza, un vividor que se aprovecha de haber terminado la guerra en el bando de los vencedores para acostarse con el mayor número posible de mujeres y abandonar a su hijo en el orfanato. Eso sí, el mismo hijo se lo ve venir, como queda claro en este otro diálogo de los dos mismos caracteres:

— ¡Qué bien lo estamos pasando! ¿Eh, Hormiga?
— ¡Fenómeno! Pablito... ¿tú tienes padre?
— No, sólo madre.
— ¿Tu madre, cuando entra en una tienda, dice "Arriba España"?
— No sé. Mi madre no entra en ninguna tienda. Está enferma en un sanatorio.
— Es que mi padre, cuando entra en algún sitio, dice "¡Arriba España!" Todo el mundo dice "buenos días" y él "¡Arriba España!"... y lo dice como gritando. ¡Y me da una vergüenza...!
— Lo hará para llamar la atención, para hacerse el chulito...
— ¡Eso es lo que me da vergüenza! A veces le contestan mal. Cuando fuimos a hacernos la foto, había un señor en la tienda que le dijo: "¡menos gritos, milagritos!"
— ¡Ja, ja, ja...! "¡Menos gritos, milagritos!" ¡Qué risa...!

(Giménez: pp. 582-583)

El libro entero está repleto de historias enternecedoras y, al mismo tiempo, afiladas, desgarradoras, ácidas. Debe haber pocas obras que reflejen tan bien el ambiente de la posguerra española. Lo recomiendo encarecidamente. Todo Paracuellos es, sin lugar a dudas, una de las obras maestras del comic español.

Una historia en la Historia.

Novela histórica dirigida al lector juvenil que narra las vicisitudes del joven Claudio, víctima de las burlas de sus familiares, amigos y compañeros de escuela debido a su cojera y tartamudez. Pese a todo (y pese a las conspiraciones de su abuela Livia para deshacerse de él), Claudio consigue imponerse a las circunstancias y llegar a emperador precisamente debido a sus limitaciones físicas.

El libro de Marianelli es de lectura obligatoria en el primer curso de ESO en la escuela a la que asiste mi hijo Nicolás, así que no me queda más remedio que leerla para echarle una mano con los comentarios.

Ficha técnica:
Título: Una historia en la Historia.
Autor: Sauro Marianelli.
Editorial: Bruño.
Edición: Decimosexta edición, Madrid (España), abril 2008.
Páginas: 233 páginas, incluyendo preguntas y comentarios.
ISBN: 842-160-9971

Todo Paracuellos.

Edición en un solo volumen de Paracuellos que recopila la serie completa de historietas dibujada por Carlos Giménez entre 1977 y 2003 en la que retrata las experiencias de los huérfanos de la Guerra Civil acogidos por la Obra Nacional de Auxilio Social. Uno de los clásicos del cómic español, sin lugar a dudas.

Ficha técnica:
Título: Todo Paracuellos.
Autor: Carlos Giménez.
Editorial: DeBolsillo.
Edición: Tercera edición, Barcelona (España), febrero 2008.
Páginas: 608 páginas.
ISBN: 978-84-8346-324-6

The art of triangulation.

In the mid- to late-nineties, the concept of triangulation was all the rage among political commentators in the US. Morris, widely considered as its father, describes it for us in his book:

The key is to recognize that it is legitimate for Republicans to worry about the elderly, education, and the environment. It is okay for Democrats to work to solve crime and welfare and to hold down taxes. Issues are not the preserve of one party or the other. Candidates, to be effective, need to cross over and show their ability to solve the other side's problems.

Bill Clinton proved this to be so. But the Republicans have yet to realize they can use their basic issues of less taxation and government regulation to win elections only if they offer credible programs for education, the environment, the elderly, and economic growth. But as long as Republicans offer no real alternatives on these Democratic issues, voters will continue to reject them. Voters will not seek low taxes and limited government at the price of jettisoning their concerns over the Democratic issues.

In addressing the other party's issues, a "me too" campaign never works. To be successful, a candidate cannot jusst mimic his opponent's rhetoric or programs; rather, he has to invent a new range of solutions to the problems historically associated with the other party. In the 1996 campaign, Clinton did not merely parrot Republican proposals, he sought to defuse the pressure for GOP programs by using Democratic means to achieve Republican goals.

(Morris: pp. 51-52).

In other words, triangulation consists in "stealing" your opponents strong issues by taking a different approach in its resolution. As such, it sounds a lot like the Third Way proposed by Clinton, Blair, Schroeder and others, something similar to the concept of the radical center, which attempts to come up with a centrist path by combining the solutions coming from both sides of the aisle in the left-right divide. It's a position that doesn't have much credit these days, in spite of the fact that Barack Obama himself has applied it to his own campaign to a great extent (although without making a big deal of it, to be sure). I understand this position may have acquired a bad reputation after Blair went out supporting Bush's adventure in Iraq, but the fact is that the position itself continues making sense, I think. Simply put, today's problems are of a completely different nature than the one the old ideologies of left and right tried to answer. And yet, they still defend certain values (equality, freedom, tradition, etc.) that are obviously timeless. To this, we also should add the fact that today's voters are far more educated and sophisticated than in the past. They dislike being treated like sport fans who are expected to join in cheering chants according to an already written libretto, preferring to choose on their own. Catechisms should be thrown out the window.

Political scandals and their ability to mobilize voters.

Morris doesn't seem to believe that political scandals have any influence whatsoever:

Scandal sells newspapers, radio programs, and TV shows. It just doesn't move voters. It attracts those who are already decided politically —base voters of either party— to the TV set, but it does little to influence the real playing ground of our politics: the independent middle.

(Morris: p. 45)

I beg to differ. It all depends on the type of political scandal we are referring to. If it only involves personal issues, as I've indicated somewhere else, I do agree they end up having little influence over electoral behaviors. On the other hand, if they involve political corruption, their effects could be the key to winning or losing an election. I do believe voters these days are way too sophisticated to fall into the sensationalistic trap that political strategists sometimes like to use. They are too often described as brainless, amorphous individuals who can be easily influenced by political marketing. Far from that, today's average voter is more educated than in the past, and also more adept at reading and interpreting messages from the media, separating the wheat from the chaff without much trouble.

Oh, and one more thing: I don't completely agree with Morris' assessment that today's elections are won by attracting "the independent middle". Yes, the "floating vote", the voters who could go either way at the last minute, is important. However, I am convinced there is another sociological group that is far more influential in the final outcome of the elections but that is usually underestimated: the one that goes out to vote sometimes but decides to stay home in other circumstances. This is the group that can make or break elections, I think. Yet, precisely because they sometimes stay home and their vote is not counted, political scientists and consultants confuse things and blame the shifts on "independent voters". Let me put it this way: I think that, for the most part, there are no independent voters. The vast majority of people feel identified with one or another side of the political spectrum, and rarely change their views. When they do, it tends to be for a period of years (for instance, people who used to vote Democrat change their preferences at a given point and start voting for the Republicans consistently). One way or another, there is no such a thing as a true "floating vote" (or, at least, not a group that is statistically significant enough to decide the elections, I think). However, there are plenty of people on both sides of the aisle who may or may not turn out to vote. These are the ones who decide the elections. Why would political scientists then fall for the idea that there is such a thing as a significant group of independent voters? The reason lies precisely in the way this behavior I am referring to here shows in the election results. Suppose there is a group of voters A who tend to vote for the Democrats, and a group B that leans towards the Republicans. If voting group A becomes actively involved in an election and goes out to vote while group B stays homes, the Democrats will win. On the other hand, if in the next elections group A stays home and group B goes out to vote, the Republicans will win. A quick look at the results will seem to clearly show the existence of a group of "independent voters" who sometimes vote for the Democrats and some other times vote for the Republicans, in spite of the fact that the reality is not truly like that. I am obviously not arguing that there are no independent voters out there, but rather that their importance is usually overestimated, I think. On the other hand, the voting group that I think is truly vital to a winning strategy (i.e., the one one that sometimes votes and some other times decides to stay home) is usually overlooked. I also think Obama's campaign proves that my hypothesis is more correct than Morris'.

Clinton and personal scandals in contemporary politics.

Quite a few people were surprised to see in the late 1990s that no political (or personal) scandal seemed to have any effect on Bill Clinton's popularity level. The clearest example of this was, of course, the Lewinsky scandal. The Republicans strategists thought they had finally caught Clinton in a situation that would pretty much force him to resign or that, at the very least, would have a significant cost for the Democrats at the ballot box. Morris, however, has a completely different approach to the issue:

One of the reasons politicians like Clinton have proven less vulnerable than one might expect to constant attacks on their characters, is that voters don't want to have to trust a candidate to make decisions for them. They want their elected officials on a shorter leash. Voters now insist that a candidate spell out his program, his vision, his ideas, and then they will elect him to fulfill that specific mandate. As Tina Turner sang, "What's love got to do with it?"

(Morris: pp. 32-33)

I'm not sure I totally agree with Morris' view though. I am convinced voters view a politician as a professional these days: as long as he delivers, we don't have to care about his personal affairs. To put it a different way: do we want to see the Government (or even media) mingle with our own personal affairs? I believe the centrality of media these days has led people to learn the importance of privacy. Sure, ogling into other people's lives is tempting, and everybody does it to one extent or another. Yet, we also know that each person's life is his or her own. We have learned to respect that, at least in general terms. As a matter of fact, I'd say that the main reason that makes a given type of media that specializes in airing information about the private lives of big stars so popular is directly related to the fact that people see it as mere entertainment. In other words, people who consume this type of media is fully aware that the whole thing may not be more than a big lie, a marketing plot set up to spread a given public image of the star in question. People are far more media savvy than we want to give them credit for. In this sense, political "scandals" that only affect the politicians' personal lives are nothing but fodder for this particular form of gossip entertainment. People couldn't care any less about them, except to gossip, discuss and joke about it. That's all. Scandals of a real political nature, of course, are a completely different thing.

Idealism as the most pragmatic course.

Although Morris' choice of title for his book may generate a good amount of mixed feelings among readers (after all, Machiavelli has come to be seen, unfair as it is, as a synonym of dirty politics and overt hipocrisy and pursuit of self-interest at any cost), the truth is that The New Prince does not read as a manual of dirty tricks. Rather, it reads as a political manual in the good old tradition started by the author of The Prince, widely considered to be the first study in Political Science. The preface already gives us a good idea of the line he follows in the rest of the book:

If American politicians were truly pragmatic and did what was really in their own best self-interest our political process would be a lot more clean, positive, nonpartisan, and issue-oriented. It is not practicality which drives the partisanship, and the never-ending cycle of investigation and recrimination in which we wallow, but a complete misapprehension of what Americans want and what politicians —in their own career self-interest— should offer. If Machiavelli were alive today, he would counsel idealism as the most pragmatic course.

(Morris: p. XV)

I totally agree with Morris on this one. How often have we heard in the past twenty years or so that the problem with contemporary politics is precisely the fact that politicians are too pragmatic (too "professional") and don't hold deep beliefs? On the contrary, I think what most citizens dislike about politics (the constant bickering, the sectarian approach to the issues, the ad-hominem attacks) have more to do with ideological dogmatism than pragmatism. Everyone is fully aware that our societies are too complex for politicians to be amateurish. This may be OK at the local level in the smallest towns, but as soon as we move to higher levels the amateur approach just doesn't cut it anymore. The people who hold most offices have to work on it full-time. They have to be professionals. There is no other choice. However, precisely because they are professionals, their main goal should be to achieve objectives, to deliver. I am convinced that citizens don't have a problem with a politician who commits mistakes or changes his mind on a particular issue, as long as he delivers. That's how voters —especially those who matter most: the independents— will judge him. They are seen as freelance advocates. And yet, Morris is right when he points out that most politicians simply are not aware of this change in perception. They continue doing politics the old way: in a partisan manner, with an ideologically-driven agenda, blinded by a set of rigid ideological principles that are seen as the magic recipe to solve all problems.

I have a little issue with Morris' choice of words though. Idealism is usually identified precisely with the sort of starry-eyed unrealistic expectation based on a given dogma. True, it doesn't have to refer only to that, but let's face it, it's what most people identify the term with. I do think a politician must have some deeply held principles or values, but she must also have an idea how to bring them to life, how to implement them in real life. Politics is the art of applying ideas to the real life by implementing it in the form of projects. It's not so different from business management after all, although most people would shy away from that comparison because it doesn't sound grandiose enough.

The New Prince. Machiavelli Updated for the 21st Century.

Dick Morris, one of Bill Clinton's political advisors and the brains behind his electoral victory in 1996, writes what he considers the essential rules for office-seekers and anyone who cares about politics. There is no theory in this book. Rather, Morris writes about the practice of running for office and doing politics based on his long experience as a political advisor to many politicians. Although his reference to Machiavelli might turn off many potential readers who may think that Morris portrays a conspiratorial way to reach power and avoid being unseated from it, the contents of the book are quite different. He simply reflects upon the essence of the political activity in the 21st century.

Technical description:
Ttitle: The New Prince. Machiavelli Updated for the Twenty-First Century.
Author: Dick Morris.
Publisher: Renaissance Books.
Edition: First Edition, Los Angeles (USA), 1999.
Pages: 252 pages.
ISBN: 1-58063-147-9

Find it on Amazon (USA, UK, in Spanish)