THE FALL OF THE ATHENIAN REPUBLIC

Historic | 1787 | Alexander Tyler

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

Thank you very much for this article.
I read it in a newspaper and cut it out.
I could not find the clipping.
This was at least 30 years ago
when I first read it.

[Little Ray]

I would argue differently. The EU is a bureaucratic despotism that curtails free speech (don't criticize a Koran...), restricts the rights of its subjects to defend themselves, etc.

[lugsoul]

"Professor Olson believes the aggregate map of the territory Bush won was mostly land owned by taxpayers. Gore's territory encompassed all of the dense population centers, where a larger proportion of citizens are dependent upon government support."

Here's a stat I'd like to see - how much of the aggregate map of the territory Bush won was land owned by the Federal government?

[skip2myloo]

There are stats that compare the Federal Taxes collected in a state versus the number of federal tax dollars they receive.

For example Washington, D.C. is a beneficiary state because for every federal tax dollar collected, they get back about $6.85 in federal tax dollars (that's exclusive of the money it actually takes to run the federal government).

I think Walter Williams had a recent article on this subject.

Anyhow, I would guess that if we were to depict the states in red and blue that were either beneficiary states or donor states -- they would correlate almost identically to the Bush/Gore states.

[lugsoul]

Well, that's a different issue than what I raised, but I'm willing to take that bet.

As to the issue I did raise, the commentator proposed that the land in the area won by GWB was "mostly" owned by taxpayers. And I thought that this assertion is most certainly not true in, say, Idaho. Probably not Montana, either. Or Wyoming, home state of the Veep. Or Utah. After all, in Idaho, Nevada, and Utah, the majority of land is Fed land. Which some folks earn a living off of, at below-market rates. Worth a consideration when you are criticizing government largesse.

[Check_Your_Premises]

"There is no immediate sign that even the socialist countries in Europe are on the verge of despotism. " I don't think they are in immediate danger of despotism but they are in such a state of moral decay and have such a childish worldview, I really don't think it would take much of a catastrophe to push them over the edge. "I suppose we're supposed to stop all the government spending, but according to this theory that's an impossibility due to human nature." Perhaps. I hate that kind of pessimistic thinking though.

When I was a young man in aircrew school, my instructor was explaining the bail out procedures. I asked him how it would be possible to go through the difficult process of acquiring a parachute, donning a parachute, and exiting from a plane that was in such bad shape that I had to jump out of it.

He said "Basically, it will give you something to do while you are waiting to die." That made a lot of sense. It sure seemed to be better than sitting their blubbing.

So maybe we can't do anything about it because it is human nature. But while we are waiting to "die" we might as well point out the problem to others and try to remedy or at least prolong our fate.

MDP

[labard1]

American farmers are not NOW dependent upon government support?

[FlyLow]

"No such book. No such qoute.
Check Edinburgh Universities website FAQ. Tytler never said it that anyone can find an actual source for.

Let's not give freedoms enemies any more ammo than they already have."

---

Perhaps their achievist cannot remember back 200 plus years!
The thought is correct and I have read this in many places over time...perhaps the validity of the Scots record keeping is the question!

[labard1]

The 1841 quote from The American Democracy Alexis d'Tocqueville ("The American Republic will endure until the politicians learn they can bribe the people with their own money."), is good enough for me.

[lugsoul]

Oh, yes. They are as well. Yet another meddlesome fact that gets in the way of those who want to characterize city dwellers as "government dependent" while believing others to be free of such a yoke.

[NewRomeTacitus]

Thanks. I've seen these quotes before but not the stats. They seem to indicate that if our representive republic were led by a single party we'd all be goose-stepping to someone's dictatorship by now ("Heil Hillary!"). The system works precisely because it doesn't.

[Henk]

Based on the title, I was kind of wondering why this is in News/Activism since the subject civilization fell quite some time ago.

Maybe because 90% of the people reading Free Republic don't pay any attention to the forums, and the remaining 10% carp incessantly about it.

[cicero2k]

OK, here's a take on where the United States are in terms of the above, many periods overlap:

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From bondage to spiritual faith;
pre 1776

From spiritual faith to great courage;
1776-present

From courage to liberty;
1865-1950

From liberty to abundance,
1890-present

From abundance to complacency;
1960-present

From complacency to apathy,
1970-present

From apathy to dependence,
1990-present

From dependence back into bondage."

[Dead Corpse]

Perhaps their achievist cannot remember back 200 plus years!
The thought is correct and I have read this in many places over time...perhaps the validity of the Scots record keeping is the question!

Could be. But doubtful. They are the conservator for his writings. Click here.

[Dead Corpse]

I prefer it as a reference due to the fact that the Library of Congress supposedly has an original copy, and you can find copies to read online.

Jefferson, Washington, Paine, Franklin, and several others have online historical websites with verified quotes and even scanned in images. Much better than plagiarized, and sometimes wholly made up, quotes.

[labard1]

You're correct. Thank you for popping our bubble (seriously, I agree with you). The point is correct if you were the first person to say it, but at least I won't run off quoting Tyler after this.

[Dead Corpse]

Actually, read his general history treatsie. Good stuff in there on the attitudes of the aristocracy from the 1800's.

[Ohioan]

You make an interesting point. But it needs also to be considered, that Athenian Democracy was a much better protected entity than what we now have. It was not universal suffrage of all residents.

William Flax Return Of The Gods Web Site

[LiteKeeper]

See Jim Black's When Nations Die