The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary. (investmentresearchdynamics.com)
Chuck Spinney, a retired Pentagon analyst, cited the late journalist H. L. Mencken who wrote that «The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed [and hence clamorous to be led to safety] by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.» (sourcewatch.org)
H.L. Mencken also was prophetic in his statements «The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed — and hence clamorous to be led to safety — by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary» and «The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false face for the urge to rule it.» (carlineconomics.com)