Posted on 12/14/2008 9:40:31 AM PST by happinesswithoutpeace
The Fall of Athens
The Greek government loses the battle of ideas, and then it loses control.
When Greece's conservative New Democracy party came to power in March 2004 it promised three things: to "reinvent" the state, to eliminate corruption and to initiate much-needed educational reform. Four years later, the situation remains unchanged: The state is still a tool for bestowing benefits and favors, corruption in the public sector is still rampant, and all attempts at educational reform have quickly fizzled out.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
/posted the article you mentioned.
Why does the author talk about “classical liberalism” and “the left” as if they’re polar opposites?
A fantastic article. Worth reading here, too, in the time of Washington gone made.
It's only later (mid-19th century on) that the idea that a utopia can be created catches on, and with it the idea that the government is the agent to do that, the inspiration for "Progressives" in America from the early 1900s to the present.
Short version: Classical liberalism is much closer to views held by conservatives (rights of the individual, markets, etc) than by socialists or “American Liberalism”.
There are those who feel that the term “liberal” has been hijacked in a sense.
Adams was irreplaceable during the Revolution. As a President, however, he stunk. He was our first liberal President, giving us travesties like the Alien and Sedition Acts. But worse, after his loss to Jefferson he packed the federal courts with more big gov't types including Marbury of Marbury v. Madison fame, which, IMHO, led to the downfall of our Republic.
Sounds like polar opposites to me
Marbury didn't get the office he was intended to receive, thanks to John Marshall's decision in Marbury v. Madison. Picking John Marshall to be Chief Justice may have been Adams' most important legacy as President.
The election of 1800 may have been the only time that the 3/5th rule (counting three-fifths of the slaves when calculating the number of seats in the House of Representatives a state got, which affected the number of electoral votes) made the difference in the outcome--without the extra electoral votes in the South because of that rule, Adams might have had more votes than Jefferson and gotten another term. Whether he would have agreed to the Louisiana Purchase, I don't know.
Why do they have to use phrases like ‘values-based narratives’. Narrative has become an intellectual buzzowrd. Buzz buzz, what is a values-based narrative.
As I recall from all that I've read on the subject he was responsible for those acts being shepherded through Congress. It was his critics that these acts were intended to silence. (But I've been wrong before, heck, I voted for a democrat once.)
Definitely the Sedition Act was intended to silence Adams’ critics, but I don’t know whether he was involved in getting Congress to pass the bill. Interesting omission in the law—it wasn’t a crime to criticize the Vice President, since the Vice President at the time was Thomas Jefferson.
If the conservative government falls, it’s exactly what the leftist agitators wanted!
Heh heh, I agree it sounds like ivoryspeak. And sadly it connotes another buzzphrase, “faith-based”, which confuses things.
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