Rule 1 of blogging: quoting yourself incessently is bad. Rule 2: Letting someone else take credit for something you said is worse. In a comment to this post I said:

You’re not alone… Representative democracy is an essential tool for a tolerant society, direct democracy leads to great thinkers drinking hemlock at the whim of the populace.

And, to answer Paulie’s question, as far as I know it’s original. And no, you can’t steal it ;-) Use it freely though.
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