[Lucius Cornelius Sulla]

You seem to have confused the Republic with Imperial Rome. The first Roman Emperor was not in office until over 150 years after the war with Hannibal. In 150 years WE might have an Emperor! In addition, while gladiatorial combat did exist, it was rather a minor entertainment, as a ritual at funerals. The first permanent gladiatorial arena in Rome was built more than 250 years after Hannibal. While Rome did have slavery, that was true of all civilizations up to and including ours.

The Republic was real enough that it was the basis of much of the thought of our founders, and did not collapse into tyranny and chaos until more than a century after Hannibal. In addition it does seem that Carthage had retained the Canaanite practice of human sacrifice of their young, reviled by the Romans, and their original next door neighbors, the Jews, who referred to this as 'making a Holocaust'.

[infowarrior]

The Republic was real enough that it was the basis of much of the thought of our founders, and did not collapse into tyranny and chaos until more than a century after Hannibal.

While this is true, as far as it goes, I believe I could reasonably contend, that the sudden influx of wealth into Rome, after having won their bid for supremacy in the Mediterranean Sea, was the root cause of the chaos, corruption, and tyrrany that lead to the destruxction of the Republic, and the establishment of the Empire. Just as the continued influx of wealth from the Empire's far-flung conquests lead to the chaos and corruption which lead to the fall of the Western portion of the Empire, similar to what happened to the newly united Spain post 1492...

the infowarrior