Posted on 11/05/2008 9:55:05 AM PST by Main Street
The Dems platform to an Obama victory.
REMEMBER THIS:
Quote: "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been 200 years.
Great nations rise and fall. The people go from bondage to spiritual truth, to great courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency, from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependence, from dependence back again to bondage." - Sir Alex Fraser Tytler (1714-1778)
United States of America: 1776-2008
Socialist States of America: 2009-
“When anything reaches its maximum potential, it turns toward its opposite.”
When the constitution was written only land owners could vote!
BUMP!
bump. . .
I would put that at 500 years. Democratic/Republican phase is much shorter than even 200 years. You could make an argument that we stopped being a Republic around 1945 -- Southerners would probably say 1861.
It’s a good thing that we are not a democracy then. For those that don’t know, we are a “Constitutional Republic”.
This is one of those quotes which cannot be verified by any documentary source. It is probably made up because it sounds good, and then had this little-remembered guy’s name tacked on it.
There are similar “conservative” Lincoln quotes; a fake Lenin quote about buying rope from the capitalists with which to hang them; the fake Hitler quote (popular in the 1970s) trying to have him endorse “law and order” in a way that would embarrass conservatives; the quote “Let them eat cake” which is not really from Marie Antoinette; &c.
The Internet makes spreading of fake quotes very easy and popular.
So, for historical accuracy, let’s try to verify some of these things.
Thanks but I know. No one is really sure who said it, but most sources reference him, so that’s who I went with. it makes no difference, as the messeage is still the same.
The Effect was seen yesterday.
There’s a story about a lady rushing up to Ben Franklin after the close of the Constitutional Convention of 1787. She asked, “Well, sir, what have we got—a Republic or a Monarchy?”
Franklin replied, “A Republic, if you can keep it.”
It wasn’t easy to establish a Republic but it seems even more difficult to keep it.
see post #10
Great quote!
The only thing which will reverse that inevitable cycle is
contained in 2 Chr. 7:14.
By the way, just the internal evidence makes the origin of this quote suspect. For one thing, it does not read like anything from the 1700s. Then the bit about an average civilization lasting 200 years is not something someone ordinary would even mention in the 1700s, partly because it makes no sense, but mainly because the mania for trying to quantify everything is a modern conceit. This make me suspect that this quote actually came from about the time of the US Bicentennial (1976), and was an attempt to get people to think, “Oh dear! What a coincidence! We are there right now, and.. and.. we’re DOOMED!”
The principle of an electorate voting benefits for themselves has truth, but it is a modern thing from the age of democracies. The idea that societies are going to go through such regular stages in perfect sequence is evolutionary, and smacks of Marxist constructs, or Spenglerian pessimism.
I would bet you a six-pack of fine Nova Scotia Propeller-brand dark beer that this quote is a fake.
Do we forget all this or simply do not know it?
We are a Republic. There is a difference.
“I would put that at 500 years. Democratic/Republican phase is much shorter than even 200 years. “
Can you give some examples of this?
And look at the silly sequence! It starts with the society going from bondage to spiritual truth. How likely is that? It is obviously trying to make people think of Biblical OT history, but bondage generally degrades, and is not all that enlightening. (If it is enlightening, then we should be very happy, because that may be the direction in which Obama will take us!)
Actually, our English-American history involves many ups and downs, and our constitutional system (derived largely from the English and the Scottish experience) came as a by-product of internal struggles ending in a standoff between royal authority and powerful, disobedient noblemen. Those in bondage had very little to do with it.
I am wracking my brains, but cannot come up with a case of a true freedom movement starting from the lower classes. Those who are really ground down just want to survive, and they seldom have the time or the wit to lead themselves in a new direction.
The American Revolution was led by relatively wealthy men. There were no true serfs here. The spiritual influence was a result of religious conflict back in Britain, which had simmered and flared over several centuries. The leaders were never those literally in bondage, but rather the churchmen and landowners of the day. One reason Americans wanted and valued liberty is that as Englishmen they were already familiar with the concept, and expected it.
I would say 1825, when President Andrew Jackson molded us into a French Democracy, then 1861, when the first of several mortal blows struck the Constitution... advancing to the establishment of the IRS and a fiat monetary system that robbed the American middle class of its wealth and property... evolving further to the World Bank and IMF so to deprive us from any chance to regain our own currency... Then the United Nations to gradually usurp our sovereignty... And finally the legalization of abortion, which marked the rejection of the 10th and 14th Amendments, and ushered in a pretense that privacy includes a right of government-sanctioned murder on a genocidal scale.
We lost our Republic long ago. Only now are the majority finally realizing that truth. Our liberties are already infringed and poisoned... It only remains for the Marxists to do their post mortum disection. Enter Barack Obama.
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