Learn from the fall of Rome, US warned

The Financial Times ^ | August 14 2007 | Jeremy Grant

[mustang buff]

The US government is on a ‘burning platform’ of unsustainable policies and practices with fiscal deficits, chronic healthcare underfunding, immigration and overseas military commitments threatening a crisis if action is not taken soon, the country’s top government inspector has warned. David Walker, comptroller general of the US, issued the unusually downbeat assessment of his country’s future in a report that lays out what he called “chilling long-term simulations”. These include “dramatic” tax rises, slashed government services and the large-scale dumping by foreign governments of holdings of US debt.

[TKDietz]

“’Roman matrons used to say to their sons: ‘Come back with your shield, or on it.’ Later on, this custom declined. So did Rome.’

— Robert A. Heinlein”

I thought that was the Spartans.

[TruthConquers]

It’s not just the debt to China, it’s all of this sub-prime bad credit, consumer credit and our nations own debt. When it all falls down, when the economic wheels fall off, who is the world going to blame? Who will they vent their anger at? It will be the US citizen, that’s who, not the democrats.

[frogjerk]

Please explain your question in more detail.

[frogjerk]

Interestingly enough, Christians were persecuted in Rome until a little after 300 A.D. and within less than a hundred years after adopting Christianity the empire split. The last emperor of the Western half of the empire was gone within 200 years of Rome’s conversion to Christianity. The Roman Republic enjoyed it’s greatest wealth and power long before Christianity even existed. I’m not at all arguing that Christianity brought down Rome. Rome had already gone way downhill by 300 A.D. It just ought to be noted that Rome’s greatest period was prior to the advent of Christianity.

Read "City of God" by St. Augustine of Hippo. He refutes the same thought some had in the 4th Century.

[HYPOCRACY]

Have some optimism. The world has been trying to destroy our great experiment since its inception. Won’t happen. It’s been more dire than this in our past.

Sometimes it takes great upheaval to effect profound change. That day is coming.

We fought a civil war, two world wars. We suffered defeats against communism, but won. Eastern Europe is emergent because of us and they know it.

We’ll get through this. The children of Reagan are only now coming into power. Think about that...

[frogjerk]

What about things like running around nearly naked, ritualized/religious sexual practices, and tribal tattoos?

Activities like you state and the ones I stated earlier would have to be judged on their meaning, context and thought through on an individual basis before making any kind of fair moral/immoral pronouncement.

[MrB]

This author is an idiot - according to him, our country will fall, and Rome fell, because of too little socialism (ie, too much individual freedom & responsibility).

No, civilizations fall when the people or rulers become so immoral that society is no longer sustainable.

[durasell]

The key word being “context.” But that gets tricky in a world that isn’t neatly partitioned off and folks can freely communicate and fly around the globe.

[HYPOCRACY]

You mean Kiwi’s with tribal tattoos are gonna come here and beat us in rugby? What about me mooning a basketball game when I was in HS?

[RightWhale]

We’re doomed. No doubt about it. The Living Dead picking through the dumpsters at the Trash Transfer Station were impressive enough that I decided for its safety to not leave my trash this time.

[OpusatFR]

We are more like Britain making the same mistakes in the 19th C, and throw in some Spainish plutocrats and the scratch-my-back role of government Spain used to create their empire and you may have it.

But Rome?

[stuartcr]

???

[stuartcr]

Please see your #12, my #16, your #21,22, my #49, then #56 & 63

[Larry Lucido]

Learn from it? Hell, we caused it!

[HYPOCRACY]

Genius.

[Realism]

Communities, countries, empires and civilizations fail when they become more dependent than they are productive.

[TKDietz]

Which thought is it exactly that he refutes?

[frogjerk]

Interestingly enough, Christians were persecuted in Rome until a little after 300 A.D. and within less than a hundred years after adopting Christianity the empire split. The last emperor of the Western half of the empire was gone within 200 years of Rome’s conversion to Christianity.

Basically, the supposed cause and effect there; not saying that you are advocating that view.

[frogjerk]

Doesn’t God already know if we are going to do that?

This one? If so, what's your point?

[x]

Rome took so long to fall that one can blame a lot of things for the collapse. A country becomes an empire, its people become dependent on the bounties of world rule, and then eventually the empire stumbles on something.

Was the fall avoidable or was an unavoidable result of the rise to empire? For that matter, was the rise to empire inevitable? And would society have collapsed in one way or another even if it didn't swell up to imperial size? Is collapse, like death, part of the big picture, always around the corner, avoided today, succumbed to tomorrow?

The Comptroller General is the head of the General Accounting Office. He or she is appointed for 15 years and is supposed to be non-partisan. Walker is the seventh Comptroller General since the position was created in 1921.