gain total power:
And I shall not be dark, but beautiful and terrible as the Morning and the Night! Fair as the Sea and the Sun and the Snow upon the Mountain! Dreadful as the Storm and the Lightning! Stronger than the foundations of the earth. All shall love me and despair!
I think it is easy to underestimate the corrupting power of despotism. George Washington understood it, but he was kind of like Tom Bombadil in that it had no effect on him.
But the truth is that 99.9999% of people are NOT Tom Bombadil.They are not even Galadriel, who was sorely tested but passed the test. No, they are Saruman, who started out good but who was then corrupted by power.
And they eventually meet (metaphorically) the same ultimate fate as Saruman.
I guess Democrats finally learned to do math. They spent the last fifteen months pretending that they could govern from the far Left and steamroll Republicans and moderates in their own caucuses. Now they can’t even get Joe Manchin to pick up the phone.