A good politician is quite as unthinkable as an honest burglar.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that finding a genuinely good politician is as unlikely as finding an honest burglar.
H. L. Mencken's quote draws a parallel between the perceived moral failings of politicians and burglars, implying that just as we cannot expect a burglar to be honest, we should not expect politicians to be truly good. The hyperbolic comparison underscores a deep skepticism about the integrity of political figures, reflecting a common belief that power often corrupts and compromises moral character.
In practice
During a political debate, to highlight the challenges of trust in politicians.
I know a good many men of great learning-that is, men born with an extraordinary eagerness and capacity to acquire knowledge. One and all, they tell me that they can't recall learning anything of any value in school. All that schoolmasters managed to accomplish with them was to test and determine the amount of knowledge that they had already acquired independently-and not infrequently the determination was made clumsily and inaccurately.
It takes a long while for a naturally trustful person to reconcile himself to the idea that after all God will not help him
It is the theory of all modern civilized governments that they protect and foster the liberty of the citizen; it is the practice of all of them to limit its exercise, and sometimes very narrowly.
The central belief of every moron is that he is the victim of a mysterious conspiracy against his common rights and true deserts.
The cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy.
It is my conviction that no normal man ever fell in love, within the ordinary meaning of the term, after the age of thirty.
When a nation's young men are conservative, its funeral bell is already rung.
We all deserve credit for this new surveillance state that we live in because we the people voted for the Patriot Act. Democrats and Republicans alike....We voted for the people who voted for it, and then voted for the people who reauthorized it, then voted for the people who re-re-authorize d it.
In time of this grave national danger, when all excess income should go to win the war, no American citizen ought to have a net income, after he has paid his taxes, of more than $25,000 a year.
If you do not take an interest in the affairs of your government, then you are doomed to live under the rule of fools.
The bringing-about of order is the first and fundamental task of government. We accept limits on our rights for the sake of a larger social compact all the time.
[It is a basic principle of a tyrant] to unarm his people of weapons, money and all means whereby they resist his power.
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