Assholes always float. Archimedes applied to politics.

7:01 a.m. The moka pot has just drawn its last raspy breath, the cup steams on the table, and the radio begins spewing its daily dose of low-frequency poison. The morning news.

Fifteen minutes of pure noise disguised as civil debate.

The voices of anyone with a microphone within range: majority, opposition, center, helmet-wearing nostalgics, apostles of compromise, and late-night talk show fanatics. A procession of clichés, verbal presence tokens, and plasticized statements good for gaining three seconds of visibility on any feed.

And as I took the first sip of bitter coffee, the image suddenly came to me, clear, surgical: a boundless pool of murky, still water, with an infinite expanse of floating turds.

Too extreme?

No. It's simple fluid physics. Archimedes applied to the Palace. And it's not just a satire on politics.

We've always been told that the best stay afloat, those who know how to swim against the current. Bullshit. Reality works the other way around. Substance has a merciless specific weight. Doubt weighs. Expertise weighs. The effort of constructing a coherent thought, which rejects the toxic synthesis of the fourteen-character slogan, drags us irremediably to the bottom.

To float undaunted on the surface of stagnant water, a single, fundamental requirement is needed.

You have to be cautious.

Completely empty inside. Bloated with air, devoid of moral substance, impervious to any sense of the ridiculous. The more fleshless and unsubstantial you are, the more you stay afloat. They never sink because there's nothing inside them capable of yielding to gravity. They've transformed the public space into a murky pool: anyone who tries to bring dignity or competence ends up submerged, while they blissfully float in the undertow of the next poll and the cynicism of those who vote for them because they can no longer imagine anything else.

Then you reach out and turn off the radio. The sudden silence of the kitchen remains.

And that's where the sarcasm ends and weariness sets in. A subtle, visceral nausea. Because at fifty, you'd like to indulge in the luxury of listening to someone who speaks to your intellect, not to the gut of the worst serial commentator from the digital abyss. You'd like to recognize a voice that speaks of truth, of effort, of respect for time and words.

Instead, we have to deal with the depressing spectacle of a power that is not ashamed to show itself for what it is: organic waste that mistakes its own buoyancy for an existential victory.

Float if it makes you feel powerful. Convince yourself you're master of the waters just because the compressed air inside you keeps you from sinking. I finished my coffee, washed my mug, and threw open the window to freshen up.

I seek beauty, everywhere. And if there's only a murky pool around me, I call the septic tank cleaning.