Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Why Did Rome Fall—And Why Does It Matter Now? [Victor Davis Hanson]
pajamasmedia.com ^ | February 11, 2010 | Victor Davis Hanson

Posted on 02/12/2010 5:58:58 AM PST by Tolik

click here to read article


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 41-6061-8081-100101-114 next last
To: JasonC

bullshit you are wrong this time around and you know it
We are entering a brave new world


81 posted on 02/12/2010 4:49:48 PM PST by dennisw (It all comes 'round again --Fairport)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 80 | View Replies]

To: dennisw
"It's different this time" is said every time, by the same tired Malthusean and Marxist BS peddlars, and they are wrong every time. For 200 years, they have never been right about anything, but they never ever give it up.

It is just foolishness...

82 posted on 02/12/2010 4:58:01 PM PST by JasonC
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 81 | View Replies]

To: JasonC

You are oblivious to the Federal unemployment statistics and the real unemployment statistics. You are being proven wrong every day by these stats

We have run out of bubbles to juice up the economy. Say all the pie in the sky free market stuff you want but this time it is real. An ideology is not a cure. The success of an ideology is the cure and your dinosaur brand of capitalism has now been rendered defunct by computers and automation


83 posted on 02/12/2010 5:09:18 PM PST by dennisw (It all comes 'round again --Fairport)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 82 | View Replies]

To: dennisw
Capitalism will continue to thrive and prosper in a world almost entirely run by computers long after you are dust and nobody remembers anything about you. Or me.

Facts are stubborn things, and the world does not bend to your fantasies. All the crazy fears of unemployment due to machines since the dawn of modern industry have been entirely refuted by actual history, and it isn't any different this time.

84 posted on 02/12/2010 5:13:47 PM PST by JasonC
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 83 | View Replies]

To: Tolik

In addition, the Anglo American has embraced the idea that the barbarian is his equal. In short, the Anglo American has abdicated his right to govern. He is being eagerly replaced as governor by blacks, hispanics, homosexuals, actors and actresses.


85 posted on 02/12/2010 5:27:53 PM PST by AEMILIUS PAULUS (It is a shame that when these people give a riot)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: dennisw
"The ultimate solution is not service jobs because we don’t need so many in those businesses. Malls and stores are closing right and left. Many to most service jobs are idiotic and provide no real benefit to society. Like all those nail salons that sprung up in the last few decades."

"We"?
Who's this "we" Kemo Sabe?
Would that be you, and who else?
Do you speak for all their customers, or for some high level "economic planners" empowered to decide what "we" really need or don't need?
Of course not.

There are two macro-economic reasons why formerly prosperous businesses fail:

  1. Obsolete business models get out-competed and replaced by newer-stronger models.

    Example: Mom&Pops replaced by shopping centers, replaced by malls, replaced by big-box & internet sales.
    Of course there are still plenty of the older stores around, but market leadership goes to the newer-stronger business models.

  2. A business cycle downturn reduces everyone's income and causes the weaker businesses to fail.

Both of these factors are at work today, and at least to some degree it's all entirely natural.
When the economy finally begins to recover (that is to say, when we can get enough conservative Republicans elected to Congress), then the cycle will start all over again -- weaker businesses will recover, new business will form, all businesses will get healthier, and new, sometimes surprising market leaders will emerge.

That's business, that's the free market, that's life. It happens. Learn it, love it, Kemo Sabe. ;-)

86 posted on 02/13/2010 4:10:48 AM PST by BroJoeK (a little historical perspective...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 68 | View Replies]

To: JasonC; dennisw
"It is just foolishness..."

You just nailed it, JasonC.

dennisw sounds like some kind of old-style Malthusian in reverse -- where Malthus said there wouldn't be enough resources to supply all of the population, dennisw tells us there will be too many resources and not enough work to keep everyone busy.

The answer, of course, is advertising.
What percentage of the population today has everything they ever wanted? One percent? One tenth of one percent?
Doesn't that mean that at least 99% of people are strongly motivated to work harder to gain whatever it is they don't now have?

The idea that we will ever run out of customer demand for various goods and services is ludicrous.
Just take one example: the recent snow storms.
How many of those people stuck in the blizzards & whiteouts do you suppose wished they were down on a beach in the Caribbean drinking pina coladas?

I rest my case, FRiends.

87 posted on 02/13/2010 4:58:23 AM PST by BroJoeK (a little historical perspective...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 82 | View Replies]

To: BroJoeK

Those malls and retailers are closing all over America because they simply are not needed today and I doubt they will ever come back. They were needed and kept in business during the bubble years when the US consumer had much bigger appetites and more fake money to squander on them

The US economy is structurally out of wack
A consumer driven economy is an idiotic economy
We have to get our production more in line w our consuming
Only problem is that due to automation and computerization we don’t need that many men to produce what what we need


88 posted on 02/13/2010 5:18:16 AM PST by dennisw (It all comes 'round again --Fairport)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 86 | View Replies]

To: AEMILIUS PAULUS
"In addition, the Anglo American has embraced the idea that the barbarian is his equal. In short, the Anglo American has abdicated his right to govern. He is being eagerly replaced as governor by blacks, hispanics, homosexuals, actors and actresses."

This is poisonous nonsense. Keep it up and I'll suggest you be banned as a racist, pal.

In truth, "Anglo-Americans" constitute well under 50% of the US population today, so they could govern NOTHING on their own. They had no "right to govern" in the first place, and so had nothing to "abdicate."

If you add in ALL Americans of direct European ancestry, then you get something like 2/3 of the population.
These people still constitute a strong majority, but that's only if you include not just "Anglos," but also non-Anglo northern, eastern, southern and western Europeans.
And there are many counties, cities and regions around the country where these people are not the majority.

None of my ancestors -- not one -- was "Anglo," and yet some of my ancestors fought in every major American war, including the Revolution and Civil War.
So I consider myself to be as American as anyone alive.
And the same could be said of many blacks and even some of Hispanic ancestry.

So don't go nuts on us pal, with poisonous racist nonsense.

89 posted on 02/13/2010 5:26:15 AM PST by BroJoeK (a little historical perspective...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 85 | View Replies]

To: Tolik
Great article.

VDH didn't mention a few things. First of all, by the end those who were ethnically Romans no longer really cared. The ones who were holding the Western empire together were former barbarians. The native Romans had all dropped out of the equation by that time.

The other issue (mentioned in part) was that the military became very involved in the politics. And that military was no longer native, and made up of mercenary troops. Increasingly they had no real feel for the culture of Rome, and didn't really view it as something worth saving.

When the last Emperor was pensioned off, most people seemed to like it. The violence and oppression of the later Western empire was very hard on the people, and the germanic kings were less oppressive.

View it as a warning for our times.

90 posted on 02/13/2010 5:29:45 AM PST by redgolum ("God is dead" -- Nietzsche. "Nietzsche is dead" -- God.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: AEMILIUS PAULUS

truth


91 posted on 02/13/2010 5:39:33 AM PST by dennisw (It all comes 'round again --Fairport)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 85 | View Replies]

To: dennisw
"Only problem is that due to automation and computerization we don’t need that many men to produce what what we need."

What is your problem, pal? Are you just stuck on stupid?

What is this "what we need" cr*pola?
Is that for YOU to decide?
Don't you suppose that everyone can decide on their own, without your help, "what we need"?

Do you fantasize there is some natural limit to "what we need"?
There is not, of course. Most people want far more than what they have, whether they truly "need" it or not.
This has always been the case, always will be -- unless the government somehow contrives to suppress or corrupt people's natural desires.

As for getting "our production more in line w our consuming," this will happen entirely naturally, as a matter of course, once economic recovery is well under way, and unemployment begins to return to the 5% range.

So, not to worry.
Everything will be fine again economically, once voters return conservative Republicans to office, and they begin to get the government out of the way of prosperity.

92 posted on 02/13/2010 5:54:21 AM PST by BroJoeK (a little historical perspective...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 88 | View Replies]

To: BroJoeK

lol my bro.
I am not a dictator who can force anyone to buy anything or can force anyone to engage in any particular business or profession

My simple comment is that most working age men have no real work to do. They are either doing ridiculous work or can’t find work. Go to the poor part of town. Go into a poor black neighborhood. Lets say every male there wants to work. The jobs simply are not there and never will be

I know a time 30 years ago and more when the jobs were there for them in light industry. Heavy industry. In many useful endeavors


93 posted on 02/13/2010 6:01:52 AM PST by dennisw (It all comes 'round again --Fairport)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 92 | View Replies]

To: dennisw

.......The jobs simply are not there and never will be.....

BS

I visited Big Bend National Park in November. Across the Rio Grande from the southern end of the park is a Mexican village. Boats, some homemade, were drawn up on the muddy Mexican shore.

The parking lot was ringed with very large boulders. Displayed on these rocks were sculptures of scorpions wrought from twisted wire. There were also beads and other simple handcrafted items. There were jars and cans to receive the payments.

The people across the river made themselves a job. If you want a job, all you have to do is get off your butt and make one.


94 posted on 02/13/2010 6:16:32 AM PST by bert (K.E. N.P. +12 . Tax the poor. Taxes will give them a stake in society)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 93 | View Replies]

To: dennisw
"My simple comment is that most working age men have no real work to do. "

Well, of course! "Worst economic collapse since the Great Depression," with 20% unemployed or under-employed. And that means some areas and some groups are 50% or more unemployed.

And the government's "economic stimulus" policy has done NOTHING except keep government workers employed. And this IS the "transformation" Obama promised to get elected.

But it's NOT the "transformation" most Obama voters expected, and they are beginning to realize that we have been had, and are so so scr*wed.

If and when a normal economic recovery begins, then we will see it develop just like every recovery in history. And if it is founded on a solid base and allowed to grow slowly, slowly, then in due time most everyone who really wants work will find something appropriate for their skills and energy.

You can be certain of that.

95 posted on 02/13/2010 6:18:50 AM PST by BroJoeK (a little historical perspective...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 93 | View Replies]

To: bert

Those are your slaves selling trinkets and you got off on that. I’m talking real jobs with real compensation in line with living a middle class existences. Your example does not qualify

Were you serious!


96 posted on 02/13/2010 6:24:41 AM PST by dennisw (It all comes 'round again --Fairport)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 94 | View Replies]

To: BroJoeK; stephenjohnbanker

This is what you did not pay attention to. I know a time when it was not like this. When there was plenty of meaningful work for males to do. In fact our building/construction bubble was an attempt to provide real jobs for guys. Work that men like to do

But it was all a bubble funded by easy money
I know a time when that kind of work was natural to our economy and not part of a bubble. But a bubble is the best that we can do these days with our out of wack economy


97 posted on 02/13/2010 6:29:48 AM PST by dennisw (It all comes 'round again --Fairport)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 95 | View Replies]

To: dennisw

Of course. Rather than sit around and whine, take some initiative and get to work. Whining about someone not offering a ob is pure laziness.

You write of an economy owned and operated by others. There is an economy of self. That must be exploited rather than sitting around whining because there is no work. .


98 posted on 02/13/2010 6:30:50 AM PST by bert (K.E. N.P. +12 . Tax the poor. Taxes will give them a stake in society)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 96 | View Replies]

To: LS

Rule #1 ;-)


99 posted on 02/13/2010 6:43:10 AM PST by stephenjohnbanker (Support our troops, and vote out the RINO's!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 67 | View Replies]

To: bert

I respect those Mexican vendors. Good for them being capitalists and uplifting themselves

Since you are so sympatico you should run off and live with them for a while to fully experience the riches their capitalism produces


100 posted on 02/13/2010 6:44:49 AM PST by dennisw (It all comes 'round again --Fairport)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 98 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 41-6061-8081-100101-114 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson