[BenLurkin]

There must have been something in the Roman soul that welcomed the barbarians when they came.

Huh?

[facedown]

That an effective response to terror is simply to start vaporizing cities, beginning with Tehran and working our way down until attacks cease.

Works for me.

[2banana]

It is interesting when Rome finally fell. They still had great cities and large population centers with industries. Yet their legions (men) would no longer fight. They had the resources but not the will. It was almost a cake walk for the barbarians to waltz in take what they wanted (including sacking Rome).

No Roman was willing to die for Rome anymore. It wan't worth it to them.

America is still strong and has a strong (and volunteer) army. But for how long? People do not join (and maybe die) in an army to protect Hillary Care, or abortion for any reason at any time or for confiscatory taxes or to turn in their private guns or for the rest of liberal socialism...

[Virginia Ridgerunner]

Bread and Circuses?

[Sherman Logan]

It must have been at one time. Rome was once a republic, and must have possessed a republic's virtues. How could it ever have accomplished so much otherwise? So what happened to change things? Wars, in a word - Rome's early history is that of a state with its back to the wall, sacked by the Goths, at constant sword's point from neighboring states.

The author does not understand Roman history. We think of a republic's virtues as including peaceableness. The ancients thought otherwise. They considered one of a republic's primary virtues that it was more effective at warfare.

If Rome's back was to the wall throughout this period, it was because they kept moving the wall. The Roman republic was never peaceable. It was specifically organized for war and conquest. The primary job of the consuls was to command the armies. It is as if Commander in Chief was our President's main function, with everything else kind of an afterthought.

In the later Republic ordinary provincial governors, with Caesar and Crassus only the most prominent, would routinely start major wars on their own initiative without suffering any consequences except increased political status.