Learning the Lessons from the Fall of Troy

On April 24, 1184 B.C., as legend has it, the Trojans looked out over their city wall, and saw the Greek ships sailing away, the Greeks apparently having given up after ten long years of war.

All that was left was a horse. A great big, huge, heavy, beautiful horse statue on wheels, bearing a note, reading “The Greeks dedicate this thank-offering to Athena for their return home.”

Well, the Trojans were no fools; they saw a great big piece of art, obviously the result of great work and of some significant value, dedicated to the Athenians’ goddess, and they did what anyone would do: they stole it from Athena, hauling it into the city walls. They patted themselves on the back for having won, threw a big party, and went to sleep.

Of course, as we all know now, the whole Greek army had not departed; they had only sent away one ship to give a false impression. A small band of Greek soldiers had hidden inside the horse, and managed to keep quiet enough in there to remain hidden until the unsuspecting Trojans had gone to bed, drunk from their celebrations.

Once within the city walls, unguarded and undetected by an oblivious citizenry, they burst out of the horse and opened the gates, allowing in an invasion force, and bringing an end to their long war by slaughtering the Trojans and destroying the once-great city. By April 25, 1184 B.C., the marvelous City of Troy – which had stood since the third millennium B.C. – was no more.

There is much we don’t know about the truth behind the legend. Troy was definitely a major merchant city in the region, founded sometime between 2600 and 3000 B.C., and there was definitely a huge fire around 1200 B.C. The architectural record, studied in detail since the mid-19th century, supports that much of the tale.

Now, the odds are certainly against the veracity of some parts of the legend. The war was certainly not started by a beauty contest between three rival goddesses… and we can’t imagine the kidnapping of a beautiful queen really launching a thousand ships (although the unauthorized assassination of a minor Austrian prince by an anarchist certainly did start World War II, so anything’s possible).

The question for us today might be whether the long stalemate was indeed finally broken by the clever ruse of a great big wooden horse, one that led to the famous saying, “Beware of Greeks bearing gifts” (a warning that the European Union might well have remembered when Greece applied for membership in their economic union).

Was the idea of a Trojan Horse really possible? Can such a thing occur? Can an unsuspecting populace really be so gullible?

The United States of America were founded, formally, in 1776, with a noble and ambitious goal: to be the first large-scale republic, dedicated to preserving the liberty of the individual citizens.

This was earth-shattering in scope. Our roots were in the British Empire, where the tradition of limited monarchy had a 560-year pedigree… but where this limited monarchy could become unlimited if the king chose to involve himself in Parliament… where the king was also the head of the church.

America’s Founding Fathers set out to limit government with iron-clad bonds. Our Constitution, masterfully designed in 1787 by the greatest band of political philosophers ever gathered together in one place, erected fence after fence around each branch of government.

The judiciary could be held back by the executive and the legislative. The legislative could be vetoed by the executive. The executive could be impeached by the legislative. The several states’ legislatures controlled the federal Senate so that the federal government wouldn’t overstep its bounds. Our carefully-constructed system of checks and balances would keep government small, enabling the private sector to grow and prosper without the jack boot of government holding it back.

But then came the 20th century, and the dawn of the progressive era. The 16th amendment was passed to enable the national government to collect unlimited taxes. The 17th amendment was passed to remove the states’ ability to restrict the federal government. Tax-funded government schools became indoctrination camps to support the government and teach an ever-more warped view of history to future voters. The franchise was broadened again and again, and the registration rules eased, to ensure that the youngest and most inexperienced could join in the selection of our elected officials. Today you don’t even have to walk to a polling place; in many states you can watch a commercial on MTV and mail in your ballot, or your relatives’ ballot, or your dog’s ballot on his behalf, as vote fraud has skyrocketed.

But even throughout all this, the USA remained strong, rising to become a world power, then THE world power, and resisted many of the efforts to compromise our strong tradition. But we became weak, we became vulnerable to the snake oil salesmen of modern politics, and a gullible people became ripe for conquest… not from without, but from within.

By 2008, after a century of battling, America was tired. A majority of voters saw an opportunity to elect a handsome progressive on skin color and a smile alone, with vague promises of “hope and change” – whatever that means – and a majority, slim and confused, but a majority nonetheless, invited him into the White House.

We had rules banning him… a Natural Born Citizen clause in the Constitution said that you can’t be president if your father was a foreign citizen… but we disregarded the rules and let him in.

The public looked at his appearance – tall, handsome, imposing – and forgot to dig deeper, and see what he might carry inside his heart. It turned out that he didn’t come into the White House alone (no President does); he came along with an enemy host, ready to attack as soon as they were safely ensconced in the friendly confines of the executive branch.

Inside this Trojan Horse was Hillary Clinton, a Secretary of State who would sell national security policy in a host of apparent quids pro quo, in exchange for donations to her family “foundation” and campaign fund. The State Department authorized Russian acquisition of American uranium reserves, terrorist acquisition of American military equipment, even the abandonment and destabilization of allies like Egypt and the newly stabilized Iraq, all on her watch.

Inside this Trojan Horse was Kathleen Sebelius, a Secretary of Health and Human Services who would jeopardize our marvelous health care system and cripple our economy by implementing a nationalization of the health insurance industry, appointing cronies to develop an unconstitutional “exchange” with a failed and costly website that has condemned much of the middle class to poverty by not just shifting, but exponentially increasing, the cost of healthcare, while diminishing available service.

Inside this Trojan Horse was a battery of IRS managers, the most famous being Lois Lerner and Douglas Shulman, empowered to harass political and religious groups in a successful effort to keep the Right from replicating their 2010 successes in 2012 and beyond.

Inside this Trojan Horse were Ken Salazar and Sally Jewell, who, as Secretaries of the Interior, have grabbed millions of acres of land from the states and from the private sector, nationalizing their use so that commerce could be thwarted, crippling the economies of states where the citizenry is on the other side of the aisle from the party in power.

Inside this Trojan Horse was Lisa Jackson, who as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency illegally redefined the agency’s mission to regulate carbon dioxide, to amend the National Ambient Air Quality Standards, and to harass private businesses on false claims of polluting the environment, driving employers out of business and out of the country.

Inside this Trojan Horse was Eric Holder, an Attorney General who would refuse to prosecute vote fraud, who would refuse to prosecute all of the above, and so many more, far too many to list, no matter how great the crime. Eric Holder has been the key deputy in this corrupt administration’s effort to undermine America from within… and his successor, Loretta Lynch, has quite literally promised to continue to do the same.

The United States is now 80% through this long and painful experience. The Trojan War ended in a matter of days, as the city burned and its legacy faded away into the ashes. The United States, however, is bigger and stronger, harder to defeat… but nothing is perfectly defensible.

This invasion is now over six years long, with nearly two more years to go. Enough of the population has learned the lesson to vote right in the midterms – in 2010 and 2014… but as of 2012, not enough had learned for victory in the higher turnout year of a presidential election.

There is a new challenge underway for 2016, as Barack Hussein Obama will no longer be on the ballot. Will the American electorate have learned by then? Will they punish themselves for nominating another lackluster Republican challenger, or will they have the sense to recognize that every Democrat nominee is now a Trojan Horse?

For this is the key lesson of our modern version of the Fall of Troy. The crimes we have suffered over the past six years are not all because of the current Resident of the White House himself. The Democratic Party has been transformed; they are no longer the well-meaning party of Harry Truman, Jack Kennedy, and Scoop Jackson. ANY modern Democrat would appoint the same kind of people to the cabinet. ANY modern Democrat would push the same policies – statism, nationalization, over-taxing and over-spending, over-regulation, the impoverishment of the middle class, the economic destruction of what was once the greatest economic engine on earth.

In 2016, someone new will knock at our door. It may be the old faces of Joe Biden or Hillary Clinton, or it may be the new faces of Marty O’Malley or Elizabeth Warren. It may be someone else we cannot yet foresee.

But the lesson of the Fall of Troy is this: don’t invite that horse into the city gates, no matter WHAT color it’s painted, no matter WHAT name or visage it has, no matter WHAT promises are written on the message it bears. The Democratic Party has become the enemy of the rule of law, the enemy of the Constitution, the enemy of the middle class, the enemy of employment, prosperity, and freedom. It’s sad to say, but it has been proven true, again and again.

We will get another choice to save our nation in 2016. This time, we must bar our city gates and keep the Trojan Horse out, so that we can set out on the long, hard work of undoing the damage and making our America, once again, the noble, honorable, free and prosperous “City on the Hill” that it was meant to be.

John F. Di Leo is a Chicago-based Customs broker and international trade compliance trainer. His columns appear regularly in Illinois Review.

Permission is hereby granted to forward freely, provided it is uncut and the IR URL and byline are included. Follow John F. Di Leo on Facebook and LinkedIn, or on Twitter at @johnfdileo, or on his own site at www.johnfdileo.com.

“although the unauthorized assassination of a minor Austrian prince by an anarchist certainly did start World War II, so anything’s possible).”

World War I, not II

Of course it was unauthorized. Franz Joseph was unhappy with the fact that the Archduke had married someone without the proper noble pedigree, but he would never have authorized shooting Franz Ferdinand.

Minor corrections ... the assassination in Sarajevo was of the crown prince (heir to an imperial throne) and his wife, and it was the spark that started World War I (not II). Little things like these tend to make the writer look like an ignoramus, or maybe a famous movie frat boy on a rhetorical roll ... Germans, Pearl Harbor, etc.

The Trojan Horse story did not have have a happy ending for Troy. Once the Greeks were within the walls of the city, with surprise on their side, they easily defeated the enemy.

Obama was the horse. Constitutional America was the enemy. Judging by the behavior of all but a few Republicans, we have surrendered. What now?

Thanks so much for the kind words, folks....

And for catching my errors in the WWI reference. I was actually originally planning on saying The Great War there, but decided to go with the standard World War I instead... and since I tend to mention WWII more often than WWI myself, that’s what I typed out of habit. I’ve corrected it now, in the original article on Illinois Review... but there’s no way for me to correct the typo here in FreeRepublic.

Thanks again for catching it and letting me know!

Now, regarding the football player picture... I’m sure that’s a good joke, but I know somewhat less than absolutely nothing about sports, so I don’t get it. Is that poor guy suffering from Achilles Heel? Or maybe a Charley Horse?

Please explain (and feel free to call me a dope for not getting it; it’s probably very obvious and I’m just oblivious!)

Cheers,
JFD

Thanks for a great article.

There's another analogy floating around comparing the US president to the German airline co-pilot who locked out the pilot and anyone else who might have stopped the devastating crash. Eight minutes to impact for the people on that flight -- eight years to destruction for the USA and its people.

I visited Troy in 1999. There was actually a "replica" of the supposed Trojan Horse at the site. It had been put up as part of an "anniversary" celebration several years before. I don't know if it's still there. I had my picture taken standing at the foot of the thing.

There were actually seven cities there, each built on top of the ruins of the previous ones. Archaeological excavation was still going on at the time of my visit, but that was closed to the public. There was a museum displaying some of the artifacts that had been recovered over the years.

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