The man looked out over the sea and spoke softly as if to himself. "I'm fifty years old. I was born during World War Three and grew up with the famines and the mass insanities that followed. I saw fighting myself in Asia. I worried about a senselessly expanding population pressing on senselessly diminished resources. I saw an America that seemed equally divided between decadence and madness. "And yet I can stand now and watch a world where we've got a functioning United Nations, where population increase is leveling off and democratic government spreading to country after country, where we're conquering the seas and even going out to other planets. Things have changed since I was a boy but on the whole it's been for the better." "Ah," said Dalgetty, "a kindred spirit. Though I'm afraid it's not quite that simple." * * * * * The man arched his brows. "So you vote conservative?" "The Labor Party _is_ conservative," said Dalgetty. "As proof of which it's in coalition with the Republicans and the Neofederalists as well as some splinter groups. No, I don't care if it stays in, or if the Conservatives prosper or the Liberals take over. The question is--who shall control the group in power?" "Its membership, I suppose," said the man. "But just who is its membership? You know as well as I do that the great failing of the American people has always been their lack of interest in politics." "What? Why, they vote, don't they? What was the last percentage?" "Eight-eight-point-three-seven. Sure they vote--once the ticket has been presented to them. But how many of them have anything to do with nominating the candidates or writing the platforms? How many will actually take time out to _work_ at it--or even to write their Congressmen? 'Ward heeler' is still a term of contempt. "All too often in our history the vote has been simply a matter of choosing between two well-oiled machines. A sufficiently clever and determined group can take over a party, keep the name and the slogans and in a few years do a complete behind-the-scenes _volte-face_." Dalgetty's words came fast, this was one facet of a task to which he had given his life. "Two machines," said the stranger, "or four or five as we've got now, are at least better than one." "Not if the same crowd controls all of them," Dalgetty said grimly. "But--" "'If you can't lick 'em, join 'em.' Better yet, join all sides. Then you _can't_ lose." "I don't think that's happened yet," said the man. "No it hasn't," said Dalgetty, "not in the United States, though in some other countries--never mind. It's still in process of happening, that's all. The lines today are drawn not by nations or parties, but by--philosophies, if you wish. Two views of man's destiny, cutting across all national, political, racial and religious lines." "And what are those two views?" asked the stranger quietly.