I believe in the next political campaign I will take the advice that I came across the other day -- too late -- in a 1937 etiquette book:
"If you care too intensely about a subject, it is dangerous to allow yourself to say anything. That is, if you can only lecture about your fixed point of view, then you should never mention it, except as a platform speaker. But if, no the other hand, you are able to listen with an open mind, the chances are that you need put no barriers whatever on any subject. At the present moment Mrs. Oldname and Mrs. Kindheart, really the most devoted of neighbors, are so violently opposed to each other on a certain political question of today, that the first person who mentions the taboo topic must pay a fine."
Sounds like an excellent idea to me!
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