Why Did Rome Fall—And Why Does It Matter Now? [Victor Davis Hanson]

pajamasmedia.com ^ | February 11, 2010 | Victor Davis Hanson

[Tolik]

Victor Davis Hanson:

Just a partial list: http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/victordavishanson/index:

Why Fear Big Government? The more of it, the more dangerous and creepy our lives become

The Trouble With Elitist Theories. Nobody likes to be lectured by those claiming superior wisdom but lacking common sense

Victory — How Quaint an Idea! Defeating Islamic terrorism is not only definable and possible, but closer than ever before

Partisanship, Then and Now

Civilization’s Lies [Victor Davis Hanson on the West embracing noble lies not squaring with reality]

America Rides Off into the Sunset. The only people excited about the “change” in America's foreign policy are the world’s bad actors

Mr. President, Words Matter. Obama, the rhetorician, forgot that people might actually take seriously what he said

Our Obama Saga [Victor Davis Hanson dissects Obama, painfully, again]

The Obamarang. [Victor Davis Hanson dissects, deconstructs, ridicules and demolishes Zero’s lies]

Trashing the Job Makers. The Obama administration’s tax-talking frenzy has left business owners feeling uncertain

Post-election Thoughts (Liberals do not understand populist outrage. Bloodletting will Continue)

Our Philosopher-King Obama. He doesn’t mind pushing noble legislation that most people oppose

Why The Great And Growing Backlash? What Scott Brown’s election portends for the Obama agenda

"Let me be perfectly NOT clear" & "Make lots of MISTAKES about it" [Victor Davis Hanson on Obama's lies]

Truths We Dare Not Speak. Five propositions that simply have become taboo

2010: Our Year of Decision

Beating the Dead Terrorist Horse. September 11 taught us many lessons. To our peril, we have forgotten them

A Humpty-Dumpty View of the World

2009 Chickens and Their 2010 Roost

Where Did These Guys Come From? The Origins of Obamism

The War Against the Wannabe Rich. Why attack the productive classes who want to be rich?

The Long March From California to Copenhagen [Hanson on debate between capitalism and socialism]

The Palin Wonder

Why Are We Tiring of Obama?

If Iran Refuses To Cooperate, Block Its Ports

Riding the Back of the Tiger [Victor Davis Hanson on Obama not understanding What Causes Wars...]

What Bush Inherited, and What He Left Left Behind

Who Are ‘They’? To Obama, “they” are responsible for all our troubles. Problem is, “they” are most of us

Afghan Mythologies. We have everything we need to defeat the Taliban.

The Discreet Charm of the Left-wing Plutocracy

Truman and the Principles of U.S. Foreign Policy. Jimmy Carter rejected the postwar consensus. President Obama appears to be following a similar path

Dr. Barack and Mr. Obama - The backlash is sharp as voters learn that Obama is not the man they thought he was

Obama and "Redistributive Change". His real agenda

The War Against the Producers

President Palin’s First 100 Days. Imagine if Sarah Palin had Obama’s record

Thoughts About Depressed Americans

Our Battered American [gets angrier - Must Read Rant]

Just a partial list. Much more at the link:  http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/victordavishanson/index

[Tolik]

 

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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/

[Tolik]

You might be interested - PING

[Servant of the Cross]

VDH is:

[Joe 6-pack]

Once again, outstanding insight and analysis from VDH.

[Cboldt]

-- wild swings in civilization are at their bases psychological: decline is one of choice rather than necessity --

Quite true. Not that the choice is "I want to decline," but rather, the choice is to abandon what should be immutable values and principles. See, in the US, the wholesale abandonment of the principles meant to be shored up by the Constitution. Rather than a weak central government, we have a strong one. See too, as James Burnham pointed out in Suicide of the West - when a civilization (and I submit this applies to countries as well) stops asserting itself as superior over other - when diversity is embraced as a strength - then there WILL be declines in order and in standard of living.

[Sudetenland]

Duh! Rome fell because the people lost interest in governing and became interested in what they could get out of government...as Juvenal said in his Satire X.

The people that once bestowed commands, consulships, legions, and all else, now concerns itself no more, and longs eagerly for just two things - bread and circuses!
Juvenal, Satires
Roman poet & satirist (55 AD - 127 AD)

[Paradox]

Socialism, or rather, the type of cultural thinking, decline, and weakness that Socialism brings. The Romans had their own brand of socialism. Bread and Circuses...

[C19fan]

Great!!! I always find it interesting how the Western Roman Empire lasted so long with all the instability and deadly infighting at the top. It would be nice to be Emperor but the minute you were on the throne you had a big bulls eye on you and your life expectancy would be measured in months.

[Woebama]

The Romans themselves by the first century AD (cf. Horace to Livy to Petronius to Juvenal) felt that the enormous influx of unearned wealth from conquered provinces had undermined the old republican virtues of small farmers and merchants (e.g. the old yeoman with four kids and a wife on five acres of grain now either devolved into the urban unemployed spectator in the Coliseum at Rome on the dole or evolved into the sterile estate owner with 50 slaves and 200 acres of wine grapes and an expensive pasture with a herd of beef cows.)
___________________________________________________________

Were they more productive than we are today? Because a rancher in Texas with 200 acres is not exactly able to support 50 slaves and be a sterile estate owner.

[frogjerk]

Read this and find out:

[Liberty1970]

I agree, I think this is the most insightful thing from a contemporary writer that I’ve read this year.

[sitetest]

Hammer meets nail.

[Crolis]

Thanks for posting. VDH is always a good read.

[Joe 6-pack]

VDH is good when he comments on current events, but his forte is in classical studies, so I truly enjoy when he correlates an event or circumstance from Greco-Roman history to our society.

Many (especially on this forum) decry the study of liberal arts like history, literature, aesthetics, etc., but the problem is not the discipline, merely the way they are currently taught. They are in many ways the underpinnings of our civilization, and Hanson's body of work echoes Santayana's famous admonition that, "Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it."

[Rummyfan]

Where does it all end? I have no idea, but offer only competing scenarios: 1) as our debt becomes unsustainable, we react and increase the retirement age, cut spending and entitlements radically, and renew our work ethic (impossible by choice, made possible by necessity), and enjoy a renaissance; 2) we become a UK-like museum, with witty cynical observers, as the new giants in Asia produce the next Microsoft, Exxon, and Ford, and we fade; 3) India and China discover that they too have a rendezvous with suburban blues, environmentalism, consumer regulation, and a pampered citizenry, and there is some sort of shared global postmodernism.

I hope for Option 1!

[Monterrosa-24]

But still your quotation is hundreds of years before the final fall of Rome. The Western Empire survived into the 400s because it was still Roman. It fell when the peninsula was flooded with those who did not consider themselves Roman but yet had the defacto status of freemen.

Do we have more and more citizens who do not call themselves Americans?

[Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus]

Good analysis, but I would quibble with one small point - “The East certainly had more defensible borders with the Danube and the Hellespont”

The Danube was no barrier. The Goths crossed it with ease, and the Bulgars used it to hit the Byzantines time and time again.

[668 - Neighbor of the Beast]

VDH does some really fine writing sometimes. This isn’t one of those.

About here: “One can see the resultant transition in the center of power— emperors mostly were born in the provinces...” I lost patience waiting for VDH to mention the Roman military, which deserves mention and most of the credit for the situation he’s exploring (including the origins and stations of numerous emperors).

By the way, Mr. H., if you’re reading: please don’t preface your commentary with so much disclaimer about what you’re NOT about to comment upon. We’ll figure that out.