Dear Reader (particularly any of you who’ve been paying taxes since the Ice Age. You’re due for a rebate!)

Here’s a thought experiment. Imagine you really think that the Habsburg monarchy should be restored. Not only that, you think that America should become an imperial holding of that empire. Every time someone complains about taxes being too high or dog owners not cleaning up after their canines, you say that such problems won’t exist under the new regime. “Once we get Karl Von Habsburg on the throne that won’t be a problem anymore!” “Karl will tax his subjects just enough but no more!” “Karl will make an example of a few scofflaws, and after that you will never have to watch where you step again!”

In other words, you’re a terrible bore about how all of our problems stem from the lack of an enlightened monarch and no one is impressed by the fact you have AEIOU (the actual acronym for Austriae est imperare orbi universo—“it falls to Austria to rule over the whole globe”) tattooed on your ass. 

Now, I should say, the utility of this thought experiment doesn’t depend on this specific desire. I could have asked you to imagine that you’re obsessed with the flat tax, or legalizing double-cousin marriage, or barring left-handed people from voting. What I’m getting at are political obsessives who think a single issue or a single theory is at the heart of everything that is wrong with America or the world.