This aloof, imperious quality in Cain made me recall an analogous incident in the life of one of history's most beloved imperious politicians, Benito Mussolini, who also took a "Never look back" approach to his past actions and their consequences. In Mussolini's case, he meant "Never look back" both figuratively and literally.
So pardon a little side trip into history. It's hopefully an instructive encounter between an amazing and under-appreciated American hero and a notoriously imperious personality.
Historical Interlude: Smedley Butler and Benito Mussolini
Smedley Butler [4] was raised in West Chester, Pennsylvania, as a Quaker. His father was a US congressman there who helped his 16-year-old son Smedley join the US Marines. As a very green second lieutenant, young Smedley served at the end of the initial phase of the Spanish American War in the hills around Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Butler went on to the Philippines, where he had a Filipino carve a large Marine globe, anchor and eagle emblem into his skinny chest. He went on to serve in China, Nicaragua, Honduras, Haiti and Europe in WWI. Over his 33-year career, he earned two Congressional Medals of Honor and reached the top rank in the Marine Corp of two-star, Major General. He was a classic soldier's soldier.
His Quaker upbringing may explain the amazing loyalty he was shown throughout his career from men in the enlisted ranks and for his ability to use wit, non-violence and arbitration to accomplish his missions. It also explains why he ran afoul of stuffed-shirt political types and at the end of his career wrote a pamphlet called "War Is a Racket" [5] about how in Central America he had been "a gangster for the Brown Brothers Bank." He wrote: "I could have taught Al Capone a thing or two." The pamphlet ends with: "To Hell with War!"
Butler was a very colorful and entertaining public speaker who used obscenities and didn't mince words; if he felt someone needed to be raked over the coals, he was unafraid to do it. When he was the commander at Quantico Marine base, he introduced Secretary of the Navy Charles Francis Adams, a man he did not like, to some of his officers by saying, "Gentlemen, I want you to meet the Secretary of the goddamn Navy."
It was in such a frame of mind that Butler took on Benito Mussolini. It was 1931, and Butler was giving a breakfast speech on "how to prevent war" to a gathering at the Philadelphia Contemporary Club. In the speech, he told about an unnamed journalist who had interviewed Mussolini while riding with him in a speeding Fiat touring car. When a peasant child dashed into the street, the car plowed right over him.
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