"Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future." Often attributed to Yogi Berra, the actual source of the quotation seems to be the physicist
Niels Bohr, who himself borrowed it from others. Anyhow, as a rogue political scientist who frowns on his discipline's unquenchable thirst for predictive power, it's a quotation of which I am very fond. It came to mind because I was recently struck by two examples of presidential optimism that, at least in hindsight, seem shockingly naive.
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| Summit at Potsdam |
In his Pulitzer-winning
biography of Harry Truman, David McCullough says that Truman, upon his arrival at Potsdam, retained
his fundamental faith that most problems come down to misunderstandings between people, and that even the most complicated problems really weren't as complicated as they were made out to be, once everyone got to know each other...He was sure if he could meet Stalin and deal with him, then he could get to know Stalin and understand him. (pp.409-410)
Thankfully, Truman wised up later on. On a related note, I also came across this quote from Herbert Hoover, from a letter to his Secretary of State Henry Stimson, written in September 1929.
It seems to me that there is the most profound outlook for peace today that we have had at any time in the last half century...it occurs to me that the dangers of war during the next six or ten years...are inconceivably less than they have been at any period since the Great War.
Oops. Btw, Hoover's quote can be found in Robert Ferrell's
American Diplomacy in the Great Depression, p.19.
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