Oh, Before I Go

Oliver Willis has a list of his best and worst Americans of all time, and it suggests a knowledge of history unbefitting someone of his age and intelligence. It reminds me of an essay I wrote after being invited to apply to be a Presidential Scholar during my senior year of high school (I won, likely due to the fact that they take a male and female student from every state, and I was applying from Utah). The prompt was to pick three people from history to dine with; here are my opening paragraphs:

Three people? I can do that. I would invite James Madison, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and John Lennon. Yes, they are all American. There is actually a good reason for this. I want three people who speak the same language as I: English. I would love to invite Albert Camus or Fyodor Dosteovsky, but who could understand them? One thing a leader must always take into consideration is the ability to communicate. It would be a rather boring dinner party if I invited Aristotle, Leo Tolstoy, and Baruch Spinoza. These were all great men, but no one would be able to talk to each other. That is not my idea of an educational evening.

So, I picked three Americans. I could have picked an Englishman, but for the topics I wish to discuss, Americans will serve best. James Madison was the easiest choice for me...

Leave aside the amateurish writing, cliches, arrogant literalism, and your own opinions of the men in question, and see how long it takes to spot the planet-sized error I missed (as did the selection committee). I first realized it while discussing the selections of my fellow Scholars at our ceremony in D.C. What can I say? I was 17.

OK, now I'm really going on hiatus. For real. Bye.