Was Democracy Just a Moment? (Oligarchy in the Future?)

Atlantic Monthly Online ^ | December 1997 | Robert Kaplan

[shrinkermd]

His observations are worthwhile. His conclusions are open to dispute.

[Bogie]

The problems are not with the essence of Christian, Islam, or Jew, but rather with hypocracy. Men tend to use religion as a tool to control other men. Moses, Jesus, and many other victums of worldly scorn, were actually working for God.

[AMMON-CENTRIST]

Parts of this article sound too much like the prophecies of the Book Daniel and the 10 toes/horns or kings.

[Cicero]

What a long-winded maroon. The first few paragraphs are enough to indicate that this fellow has a very superficial view of history.

[Zoey]

Interesting.

[KJMorgan]

What a long-winded maroon.

Short attention span?

[Raymond Hendrix]

I only have time now to scan the article but the author seems to make some valid points from what I have read of it. Democracy in itself is not moral. The morality of it depends on the morality of the people doing the voting. If the people become immoral then we end up with a democratic cesspool that is no better than a dictatorship. At least with a good and moral King we have the hope of restraining evil whereas with a corrupt democracy we have little hope until there is general repentance. America needs to stop pretending that we are moral because of some successful principles we have used on how to organize a government.

America's Other Jesus

[WIMom]

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[Free the USA]

Good article

[WackyKat]

Kaplan is one of the best political observers going. He hasthe ability to look at the situation from a distance and see things as they really are.

[billybudd]

Good article, thanks for posting. I was thinking the same thing you said while I was reading it.

[Elihu Burritt]

Democrats have always hated the ideas of the founders, particularly those about ethical government by the people. They have always gone for government by 'those who know best,' which is not a bad idea as long as you can keep democrats out of the picture.

To a democrat, rule by the people has alwasy meant either rule by armed forces or rule by the mobs.

[Sawdring]

Hehe.

[MissAmericanPie]

As we can see in our own country, we have a double whammy going. Both the tyranny of the majority, and the tyranny of the individual. An entire community has to lay aside it's nativity scenes, it's confederate flag, it's religious identity, it's sexual morality, any part of it's culture that offends one person, due to the Supreme Court.

While the founders tried to protect our voting system from the tryanny of the majority via the Electoral College, you have scum like Hillary determined to do away with the very tool that keeps the red areas from having a boot in their neck by the relatively small blue areas.

We still are subject to the tyranny of the majority in many other areas of government both local and national, the monsterous EPA for example, and it all has grown to the point of being unbearable.

[Fiddlstix]

Bump

[Uri’el-2012]

What a long-winded maroon.

4 posted on 12/4/01 8:05 PM Mountain by Cicero

Yes!

But he is also a superficial socialist dilettante.

Never once did he state in his readings from the Founders that this should be a Republic not a Democracy.

If he had ever read the Federalist Papers he would have read the arguments against being a democracy.

This country was once great when it was a Free Republic.

However as we plunge into democracy, we will plunge into totalitarianism.

Barukh haba b'Shem Adonai
Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord
Y'shua haMashiach

XeniaSt

[neutrino]

Good article. Frankly, I suspect that he's correct - that Democracy will pass from the scene. I'm not sure that's a bad thing, considering that in many ways the US began as a sort of oligarchy. Anyway, we're a Republic. And only property owners could vote. Democracy, though widely touted, is not what this nation was founded upon.

[Cleburne]

He seems to acept the common mantra that our nation is a democracy. It isn't-that was obviously not the intention of the Founders-they intended a republic. But, and this is a perception that grows daily it seems, our government and the people of this nation see it and refer to it as "democracy"-what implications that has for the survial of the republic, if any implications, I don't know. However it is quite clear to me that our republicain form of governing is crumbling. And in this he makes good points-though they are far better suited to pure democracy, which almost inviteably leads to some form of tryanny. The question of course is will this tryant be a benificial one or a nad one? The past century has given us mostly cruel, barbaric tryants, so it would not seem to bode well.

This move we are going into, towards ever increasing tryanny and removal of cherished rights, it troubles me ans vexes me in a way distinct from those of previous oppresive regiems and despots: it is slow and creeping, it never takes large bounds, but is rather very incremental, slowly accumulating, taking occasioanl blows, and building upon itself-oft times by people who do so either unintentionaly or out of truely sincere ambitions, or even out of motives that are required at the time-such as may indeed be the case with recent acts to combat terrorism: only time can really tell, for these are, many of them anyway, measures that must be taken. But I fear their reprecutions if drawn out and mis-used. But that is a danger will must face, one could (and near rightly so I think) argue. It is inherent that we trust our government at least on occasion.

Well, supposing a one world government does come to pass, ot will likely occur at some time in my future, seeing as how most of y'all are considerably older than me. If I can have any say in it, should the US fall to some nasty NWO type scheme, they'll see a bitter outbreak of Southern patriotism that will if nothing else make their pursuits hard won ones. And that could well be a deciding factor in any one world governemnt: there will always be, I think (and history has agreed with me on this so far) some disenting factor, and it could come from religion (especially Islamic extremists which will almost certainly resist if there any left) and nationialist minded peoples. But then the genius of creeping tryanny may squelch any disenters by very virtue of its suprise tactics.

[Honorary Serb]

Well, a world government has been emerging....I refer to the increasingly dense ganglia of international corporations and markets that are becoming the unseen arbiters of power in many countries.

There is another name for this only-economics-counts type of "beyond the nation state" world government--the New World Order.

Kaplan is a notorious, gold-plated NWO cheerleader. (He's really a NWO pseudo-intellectual hanger-on, with--like most of his ilk--pretensions to be more than he is.) Like other NWO boosters (Strobe Talbott comes to mind), he is anti-Serbian, anti-Christian, and contemptuous of all Americans other than the small cadre of NWO elite and their vassals.

It is the NWO that has set us up for attack by islamic thugs (which it uses to do its dirty work all over the world, but have gotten beyond even its control), for the loss of our national sovereignty, and for the loss of most other things that we really value besides. I say PHOOEY to the NWO, its goals, and its minions!!!!!