Just a partial list: http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/victordavishanson/index:
Just a partial list. Much more at the link: http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/victordavishanson/index
Ping !
Let me know if you want in or out. Links:
FR Index of his articles: http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/victordavishanson/index NRO archive: http://author.nationalreview.com/?q=MjI1MQ== Pajamasmedia: http://pajamasmedia.com/victordavishanson/ His website: http://victorhanson.com/
(p.s., Yes, I know there's a typo in it)
Great article! obama’s ego is such that he can never concede his “noble” plans for the masses will not work. He is a spoiled brat who was encouraged to believe that collective ideals are the way forward in America.
He will never figure it out while president. I just hope others figure HIM out before he destroys the country.
Spot on, as is the usual VDH.
The secret societies that installed him as their puppet and front man
to impose socialism and population control no doubt think it's funny.
The affirmative action Philosopher-King (as Fabian Socialist).
The joke's on you and your tax bill.
"Most of us believe socialism is what the socialists want us to believe it is - a share-the-wealth program. That is the theory. But is that how it works?... If one understands that socialism is not a share-the-wealth program, but is in reality a method to consolidate and control the wealth, then the seeming paradox of super-rich men promoting socialism becomes no paradox at all. Instead it becomes the logical, even the perfect tool of power-seeking megalomaniacs. Communism, or more accurately, socialism, is not a movement of the downtrodden masses, but of the economic elite." - Gary Allen, None Dare Call It Conspiracy
A very brief look at Greek history shows that Greece rejected the concept of an oligarchy. The figured out that it was better to be ruled by the decisions of many rather than the decision of a few.
I hope the lesson is permanent.
Control, accumulation of power in a government elite--all the things America's Founders fought against and wrote a Constitution to disallow from ever happening in America.
Yet, a presidential candidate in 2008, at a rally in Virginia, was recorded saying, "If you'll stand with me, then I know that we can win Virginia and we can win this election and we can finally bring the change we need to Washington . . . . I feel like we got a righteous wind at our backs here," he stated.
Ironically, a similar phrase can be found in the sayings of another political head: "The ill wind of opportunism is falling, the righteous wind of socialism is on the rise." - Chairman Mao
After a year, how's that "righteous wind" feeling to most Americans? Given the source of the phrase, perhaps it is more like a chilling blast from the past sad histories of nation after nation where the power of "the People" was turned over to an elite group who promised much and delivered little but oppressive taxation and loss of liberty.
Plato’s Republic was not a democracy so VDH’s analogy can extend only so far, however, democracys were the closest to tyranny and that is where the analogy can be picked up again. What informs the philosopher/kings? Contemplation of the forms or laws. There is no law with Obama, but should he start with modern natural law, which is embodied in the Declaration of Independence and stay only within the constitution, it would be a good start.
Victor’s last point is the important point. Plato was smart enough to know that his communistic community defied nature and could only come into existence if chance or fortuna was beaten. The modern project thinks it can be conquer chance — Machiavelli in The Prince likened fortuna to a woman who should be slapped into submission. That attitude of conquering chance and nature (and human nature) is what drives the Enlightenment and, politically, what drives communism. Communism is a child of the Enlightenment, born out of man’s faith in reason to solve his problems — rather than appealing to god or a religious understanding of man. Religion sees the corruption (sin) in man as a permanent part of his nature, part of his inheritance from his fall from the Garden of Eden. Communism is the attempt to correct mankind and create a heaven on earth without religion. This is where pride in the perfectibility of man through unaided reason leads to some of the 20th century’s biggest mass graves and graveyards. Plato was smart enough to know where the limits of political philosophy (reason) and reality met. Obama is from the school that doesn’t care to know... or worse, believes there is no reality, that there are only (as Hamlet would say) “words, words, words,” only narrative.
