“The less people know about how sausages and laws are made, the better they sleep at night.”
— otto bismarck
Widely attributed to Bismarck from the 1860s-70s, this remark captures his Realpolitik philosophy. While the exact origin is debated, it became synonymous with his pragmatic style of statecraft during German unification.
I spent decades in rooms where treaties were written and wars were started. I learned that the public wants results, not details. When I pushed through the anti-socialist laws while building the world's first welfare state, people called me a hypocrite. I called it governing. If you wait for a method everyone admires, you will never act. Do what needs doing, and let them judge the sausage by the taste.