Is This the Party About Whom I am Speaking?

People can be prescient sometimes, don’t you think?

Photo by Girl with red hat on Unsplash

Some of you who old enough might recognize the title as a slight revision of wonderful comedian Lily Tomlin’s terrific phone operator sketch from days gone by: Is this the party to whom I am speaking?

Here’s a quote from a famous person talking about another famous person, and I was wondering if anyone could guess (without resorting to Google) who the source of the quote is and who it’s about.

I’ll identify the person, the circumstances, and the subject at the end, but will also do a little fun sleuthing and analysis along the way.

Here goes:

“When one compares his utterances of a year or so ago with those made fifteen years earlier, a thing that strikes one is the rigidity of his mind, the way in which his world view doesn’t develop. It is the fixed vision of a monomaniac and not likely to be much affected by the temporary maneuvers of power politics.”

Let’s unpack all that a little and see what we can accept as helpful to answering my question of who it’s about:

• It’s about someone who has been making utterances for at least 16 years that seem to be the same over that time,
• The someone is a male (his), and…