Are We Going the Way of Rome?

Mackinac Center for Public Policy ^ | 9/1/01 | Lawrence Reed

[happydogdesign]

"A strong moral people can withstand all kinds of severe hardships and setbacks and still survive, even grow stronger, in the presence of them. An immoral people falls to whomever or whatever seeks their demise."


Utter nonsense. There are countless millions of strong moral people fertilizing the local flora.

[happydogdesign]

As the great Henny Youngman once said,"I call my mother-in-law hon-she reminds me of Attila."

[highlander_UW]

In brief, Roman Civilization was destroyed by Clintonius, Daschleius, Schumerian, Streisandian, and Iessiiacksonus.

Amazing how history repeats itself, isn't it?!

[Mr. Mojo]

He can't say no.

Certainly not to bills; hasn't votoed one of the damn things yet. Reagan had already squashed 20 by this time in his first term.

[highlander_UW]

And speaking of unrestrained spending...

The new VoteTally report on the last Congress – just released this morning by the National Taxpayers Union Foundation – cuts through all the rhetoric and pulls back the curtain. Every member of the 107th Congress – regardless of political party – fell neatly into the "big spender" category.... For the first time, since NTU began keeping these records, not one lawmaker supported a net reduction in Washington's bloated budget – not one!

source: http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=36199

[lainde]

bttt

[leadpenny]

I like the positive spin the author takes, viz, it's not too late to reverse the negative trends.

I like to agree with you but Social Security alone stands to bring this country down when the base of the pyramid crumbles.

[tm22721]

Any electrical engineer can tell you the ramifications of positive feedback (spiraling out of control). Negative feedback (regulation within defined bounds) is the basis of any stable system.

Our system has been falling apart ever since women started to assert influence in the late 19th century. The trend was made irrevocable (positive feedback) when women were given the vote.

BUMP

[magslinger]

Great post!

[sawyer]

Also, as always, new thoughts begin to more in and take over. Guns have never been able to stand up to thoughts that comes into mens minds.Or armies either. One thing we can plan on is change. What empire has lasted or will? None.

[Cronos]

The Brits did the same thing -- by the start of the 1800s they were the dominant power. Then, they started to think themselves a superior race and had become increasingly effeminate. They would have been knocked out by Germany if we hadn't gone to save their sorry behinds twice.

[Cronos]

Rome defeated Carthage centuries before Christ. Their rival in the 400s was to the East -- the growing Parthian empire in Persia and the Armenian Empire.

[PGalt]

No. We are going the way of America, and very good articles like this will help to keep us going that way. Thanks for the post.

[Cronos]

Diocletian DID try to split the Roman Empire with two Augustuses (himself and his co-ruler, can't remember the name) or is it Augusti? and two Caesars -- one of whom was Constantine. Each would rule one half of the Empire. Soemwhat similar to what the Hapsburgs tried to do by splitting to become the Austro-hungarian empire.

[Cronos]

Angkor Wat is comparatively recent. Think of more ancient Empires/States: The Sumerian city states fell due to barbarians at the Gate (the Amorites -- Semitic peoples and ancestors of Arabs and Israelis), the old Egyptian Empire to floods and famine, the Indus valley civilisation to floods, the Chinese to internal strife.

[Cronos]

The Cham kingdom? The Mauryan Empire was in India, correct? With some ancient version of Macchiavellis Chanakay something.

[Cronos]

The Huns were nomads from Central Asia, richtig? I remember reading soemwhere that the huns sacking Rome was caused by the Chinese Empire at that time (can't remember the dynasty). Strange?

Well, it goes like this: the dynasty found that the great wall wasn't too much of a barrier to prevent barbarians from entering the middle Kingdom so they didnt' wait for the barbarians to enter the gates, instead they went into barbarian territory and slaughtered them. The nomads, to escape, headed West and pushed the Turkic peoples (the Huns being one of the Turkic peoples) who in turn pushed the Slavs out of Central Asia into north eastern Europe. The Slavs pushed the Germans out of the Caucasus, North eastern Scandanavia and into Roman lands. Finally, Attila came along with his turkic tribes and said:"Hey, the Western donkeys can't ride horses very well" and so he moved West and sacked the Western Empire.

The White huns also invaded Central Asia and Eastern Iran and Western india, moving into places like Baluchistan and Rajasthan mixing with the Scyths there.

Genghis Khan did the same in a much more impressive way -- of course most of his energy was dissipated conquering China where his grandson Kublai Khan reigned. His other grandson was about to conquer Western Europe when he died of alcoholic poisoning -- so Europe was saved (imagine a Europe with the Mongols in charge, but then it may not have been that bad -- look below). His other descendents were pretty illustrious as well -- Timurlang or Timur hte lame who conquered cnetral Asia and iran and knocked otu the Caliphate in Baghdad and The Mughals in India who set up an Empire which was rich enough to be talked of in hushed tones by Portuguese traders.

The Mongols were also the only folks to conquer Russia -- maybe Napoleon and Hittie should have attacked from the east!

[LTCJ]

We're about there, or perhaps beyond it.

Maybe this can help you drive a stake in the ground:
True or false - 51% of the people politicians of both political parties adopt the strategy that they can vote win themselves the White House by providing largesse from the public trough.

"Karl Rove, meet your party in the 'lesser of two evils' loading zone."

[thesummerwind]

The penalty men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men. -Plato

All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing. -Edmund Burke

The hottest places in Hell are reserved for those who-in a period of moral crisis-maintain neutrality. -Dante

These guys were talking about The Supreme Court decision on CFR?