Re-reading the Lord of the Rings, Chapter 36

There's just one thing that I want to point out here, namely that Sam's shrewedness and his assumption that his master suffers from some kind of blindness springs from the fact that a servant doesn't have to take chances, for he, who faces the world, and not his master, deals with many unknowns and must follow the course that his belief is showing him, and to him, who knows all the turns of events in his little corner of the world, he must appear a dangerous dreamer.

The case here is exemplaric though. Frodo's belief guides him to Cirith Ungol, not to Gollum's reformation, as Frodo frames his belief, but to passage into Mordor, in the way that Galadriel's mirror promissed. So it is, we have a premonition of what's to come, but it's patchy and although our belief might fulfill its promise, we'll find surprises on the way, even to the extent that we have to reformulate our belief to get closer to its reliable core.

There's a political component to this as well. The people, who do not vote themselves on the passing of laws or entries into wars, will always be unfair judges of those who do, the effect of which is the importance of the media, as the mouth through which all unfairness is uttered. Many journalists are aware of this, but they don't realise that the reason for this lies in the truncated responsibility of the people. So by trying to be as fair as possible and defending the system, they are actually perpetuating the danger of populism and they are also opening the doors for those, who systematically exploit this fear of journalists and pushing through the blatantly indefensible. In the elder days the Church took it upon itself to deal with the worries of the servants, for which it was better suited, because it was joined with the servants in belief. I think, even a free (european) people need a church, though with fewer responsibilities, but as long as they are belittled, they certainly do, or they will fall one way or the other.