What one can learn from science fiction (or pretend to have learned, anyway)
Today's New York Times contains an inspired and funny discussion of which science fiction stories the current presidential candidates should claim they've read or ought to read:
Check the rest of it out. It's pretty awesome.
RUDOLPH GIULIANI
Former mayor of New York
Should tell reporters he’s read “Childhood’s End,” by Arthur C. Clarke: An advanced intelligence arrives from above, creating a utopia by integrating all of humanity into a single mind that thinks and acts as one.
Might also consider reading “The War of the Worlds,” by H. G. Wells: During a cataclysmically destructive event, an observant bystander happens to be in the right place at the right time and thereafter never stops talking about it.
...
HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON
Senator from New York
Should tell reporters she’s read “Dune,” by Frank Herbert: Left adrift to wander in a desert wasteland, the scion of a deposed dynasty retakes the family’s lost throne in thrilling and violent fashion.
Might also consider reading Herbert’s “Children of Dune”: A calculating despot undergoes the ultimate act of political triangulation by transforming himself into a part-human, part-worm creature and going on to rule for what feels like 3,500 years.
Check the rest of it out. It's pretty awesome.
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