-- Benjamin Franklin
Posted on 12/28/2011 7:41:33 AM PST by Iron Munro
Can American civilization collapse? You bet. All others have. We don't need a Mayan calendar to foreshadow the end. Signs are everywhere, we just need a brain to process the onslaught of information.
Of the various cataclysms that 2012 may herald, the first significant one is the Dissolution of the American State.
In America, when we speak of "the state" we mean something like New Jersey. In Europe and elsewhere, it is the central government, including provincial and local governments. It is an entity or apparatus with a life of its own. For most of the history of the world, with very few exceptions, "the state" has been legitimized by gods and kings. As Louis XIV of France declared, "I am the State." Until the American Revolution, there was a wall of separation between government and its people.
Our American State is founded on the principle of "We the People" as the source of all legitimate authority. Its operation is exemplified by Lincoln's famous characterization of it in the Gettysburg Address: a government of, by and for the people. But who today believes our current government embodies these principles?
There is no government "of the people" because "We the People" can't afford to run for office. Candidates need personal fortunes or else most (but not all) will sell out to the special interests.
"For the people"? Only in a convoluted way. Almost 60 percent of all Americans (dependents included) get 100 percent of their income from government (federal, state and local): as workers, Social Security and SSI recipients, other pension beneficiaries and general assistance. The American State, as paymaster to so many people, has created a class of servants. Perhaps this is why the government has no fear to serve itself first. For example, Congress has its own retirement program (not Social Security) its own health benefits and other lifetime perks. The American State also spends billions and billions on programs for corporate and other special interests, thus assuring its survival.
Worse yet, our government is now a "house divided against itself." It is clearly dysfunctional. Elections are an excuse to sow seeds of hatred and discontent.
There is ubiquitous belief that government doesn't serve the public good, and there is an overwhelming lack of confidence in Congress.
Our state can save itself, but not its people. It cannot solve any of the complex problems we face, such as crushing debt, health care, educational reform, immigration policy, failing infrastructure, poverty and underemployment.
When the general population has no faith or stake in the state, it will collapse.
Given the seething discontent, two major political issues related to the 2012 presidential election will act as flash points signaling the reshaping and eventual demise of our current state. First is geo-politics, whereby a candidate can dominantly win urban populations in a select number of states and become president. Also, a candidate may win the popular vote and yet not be president. The second is the coming call for the elimination of the Electoral College. Where we go from there is an open question.
Many believe that we can replace our American State with a global system of government that can solve our problems. This would only make matters worse, making what is complex impossibly so. Consider government debt. For a shocking analysis of United States and world debt, go to www.usdebtclock.org. Despite what propagandists say, these liabilities can't be paid off.
The easiest way out of our debt is to destroy it and U.S. sovereignty by merging it into a world SuperState. After many trillions of wealth are destroyed by taxation, inflation and confiscation, and after much strife, a super-government run by a small number of elites will constitute a new state. There will be fewer liberties and fewer opportunities, but lots of gadgets, games and techno-diversions for all.
But wait. One thing has not been considered. America is still a government "BY THE PEOPLE." We do have the power to change things, to create an alternate future. The Tea Party has made some significant moves in electing "new" people, albeit from only one party. Occupy Wall Street, distrustful of both parties, may yet provide an impetus for the emergence of new leaders — perhaps even new parties.
What we most desperately need are different kind of leaders. Most current ones are living homages to a credo of Wealth, Power and Fame. We need servant-leaders, people who prioritize service first.
Such leaders prize humility, espouse a sense of community, of nurturing — even of healing. Potential leaders like this do exist among "We the People." Many more can be found/created.
All of this takes time, and in this crazy age, time is compressed. Now that we are on the downward slope, can "We the People" reverse momentum?
We have done it before and we have not yet perished from the face of the earth.
The only statement Obama has made that I agree with is that "people should have skin in the game". Too bad he didn't really mean it.
"Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself." -- John Adams
Let’s go back to “only landowners vote”. That is “skin in the game”!
America needs people like Cain and Palin.
But people like Cain and Palin can see the overwhelming and very well funded opposition against them, they know millions want them to be leaders but at the same time they see a battle of suicide bombers running against them and they have no defense.
America is too socialized already, they will NOT act individually, all they want to do is to await a leader, self iniative has been brain washed out of “We the People”.
And the very idea that some damned outsiders could deprive an incumbent of his deserved reelection sent shock waves through DC. Wait until a few incumbent Democrats get picked off - it will suddenly be time to open some FEMA Death Camps. :)
Holy smokes, that comment from Franklin is perceptive and incredibly concise! Wow, great post!
It will always be this way. You cannot kill an idea.
Whether it is a bloody transition from totalitarianism or simply a re-organizing...people will come together when the dust settles and will base their new government or new societal order on those precepts and ideas initiated by 56 brave and visionary men 235 years ago and enumerated in a second document 224 years ago.
It already has.
I agree. Collapsed on Nov. 4,2008.
So honorably discharged veterans and active duty service members who don't own property have no 'skin in the game'?
I believe it was Alexis de Tocqueville who pointed out well over a century age that the United States would survive only until the American People discovered they could vote themselves largess from the public purse.
The federal government has no constitutional basis for being involved in any of these areas, except immigration policy.
The Feds are in these areas because Democrats are in the business of vote-buying and they and their judges have warped the Constitution, and as a result, America is collapsing as we speak.
I agree with posters above, who talk about limited sufferage. Only people who actually pay a federal income tax should vote, and (ducking for cover), women should NOT have a vote, under any circumstance. The vast majority of them think only in terms of what is good for themselves, rather than what is good for the county. Maybe only Freeper women could vote.
All we need is love.
More Christianity, then more committed marying and breeding. We need more faith-filled, breeding, homeschooling, committed parents.
“What’s wrong with the world? I am” said G.K. Chesterton. Start in your own home and you’ll fix an entire country.
If only Obama’s father and mother had too....where we’d be today!
Fix tomorrow - start today.
Jesse Louis Jackson, Sr., began proposing the collapse of “Western Civilization” in 1988. Millions would cheer were this to occur.
Actually, on February 12th, 1999 - when the US Senate declined to convict and remove a corrupt President because doing so might have endangered their own re-election prospects. That was the official Republic-to-Empire transition date, though the seeds were sown long before.
"It will always be this way. You cannot kill an idea."
When Obama recently compared himself to Teddy Roosevelt he was just mindlessly regurgitating words written by another. It is obvious that neither the speaker or the writer had done their homework.
"Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does NOT mean to stand by the President or any other public official save exactly to the degree in which he himself stands by the country. It is patriotic to support him insofar as he efficiently serves the country. It is unpatriotic not to oppose him to the exact extent that by inefficiency or otherwise he fails in his duty to stand by the country."-- Theodore Roosevelt
I swear....If that man told me the sky is blue I’d have to look up just to check.
“Can America Civilization Collapse?
It already has.”
It’s a natural consequence of ignoring our Founder’s Advice And rulebook at virtually every turn of the road. They cuationed us to beware of foreign entanglements.
We’ve become the World’s ATM machine, and then when we’ve a disagreement with the murderous despots/spoiled children Using the Debit Card we gave them, we send in Our young folks/military to discipline them.
Countdown to being Flamed in 3,2,1: History teaches us again and again what the price of empire building is.
Germany/Italy/Japan 80 years ago.
Great Britain in the 19th Century.
The Roman REPUBLIC disintigrating into the Roman Empire.
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