Random Thought
The Fall of the Roman Republic is best told by myth, especially its last 15 years. Fictions will be written, acted, and sung about it forever. But for those of us who were more curious, the story goes back a ways. You see, everyone loves the Empire. People in the street still remember who Nero was, they might know Caligula, Marcus Aurelius, or Constantine. Most everyone has seen a Caesar on a stage die. The Empire is sexy and it sells. Everyone loves the Empire.
No one loves the Republic. We are unfair in only portraying its last two generations. You can't really understand what happened unless you love the Republic too. No one would love the Empire if everyone only knew the history of the Empire after Theodosius’ death in A.D. 395. No one loves the Republic. The Romans, even of the Imperial Age, were a conservative people, and their culture was one based on the highest values: truth, sacrifice, public service, and self-control. The Early Republic and Middle Republic were full of excellent charatcers and horrible rascals. The Age of the Scipios was the height and the doom of the Republic. It was the empire which destroyed the Republic. The empire, not the Empire... you see, uncapitalized? It was the provinces. The wealth which a governor could win for himself, if he were [ahem]corrupt[ahem] became so enormous that the Roman upper classes, theretofore a largely very principled group became the savagely greedy and corrupt ruling class that we see typified in the last generation of the Republic. The empire destroyed the Republic.
I find it interesting that each successive American Presidential Election has been more expensive by far than the one before it. This has gone on for decades and is no one worried? The government public financing system of Presidential Elections was just made strikingly obsolete at one stroke. In four years, the amount of money generated by copying this method of political fundraising will lead heretofore unheard of amounts of money into it. And the Election after that.
Our Election is watched eagerly by every Government on the Planet. We are choosing who gets to sit in the highest Office in the World. Our economy can easily continue to afford all this. But for how long? 30 years? 50 years? What happens if our leadership of the world becomes so important that foreign powers begin to feel that they should have a say in our Presidential Elections too? Foreign contributions to Presidential campaigns are illegal, now. What if those became unenforceable somehow? Say, through under-the-table back-channels? The empire. Our empire. But not now we say. We are not so powerful, yet. Do keep in mind that our military spending is almost as much as the rest of the World. And that our Navy is larger than all other combined navies in the World.
Will we have an Empire? Imperial American Caesars? His Geomajesty? Let’s not be silly. But then, remember that you don’t need emperors to have an empire. And it was the empire, not the Empire, which destroyed the Roman Republic.
That flashed through my head in about ten seconds. Why does my brain hate me?
No one loves the Republic. We are unfair in only portraying its last two generations. You can't really understand what happened unless you love the Republic too. No one would love the Empire if everyone only knew the history of the Empire after Theodosius’ death in A.D. 395. No one loves the Republic. The Romans, even of the Imperial Age, were a conservative people, and their culture was one based on the highest values: truth, sacrifice, public service, and self-control. The Early Republic and Middle Republic were full of excellent charatcers and horrible rascals. The Age of the Scipios was the height and the doom of the Republic. It was the empire which destroyed the Republic. The empire, not the Empire... you see, uncapitalized? It was the provinces. The wealth which a governor could win for himself, if he were [ahem]corrupt[ahem] became so enormous that the Roman upper classes, theretofore a largely very principled group became the savagely greedy and corrupt ruling class that we see typified in the last generation of the Republic. The empire destroyed the Republic.
I find it interesting that each successive American Presidential Election has been more expensive by far than the one before it. This has gone on for decades and is no one worried? The government public financing system of Presidential Elections was just made strikingly obsolete at one stroke. In four years, the amount of money generated by copying this method of political fundraising will lead heretofore unheard of amounts of money into it. And the Election after that.
Our Election is watched eagerly by every Government on the Planet. We are choosing who gets to sit in the highest Office in the World. Our economy can easily continue to afford all this. But for how long? 30 years? 50 years? What happens if our leadership of the world becomes so important that foreign powers begin to feel that they should have a say in our Presidential Elections too? Foreign contributions to Presidential campaigns are illegal, now. What if those became unenforceable somehow? Say, through under-the-table back-channels? The empire. Our empire. But not now we say. We are not so powerful, yet. Do keep in mind that our military spending is almost as much as the rest of the World. And that our Navy is larger than all other combined navies in the World.
Will we have an Empire? Imperial American Caesars? His Geomajesty? Let’s not be silly. But then, remember that you don’t need emperors to have an empire. And it was the empire, not the Empire, which destroyed the Roman Republic.
That flashed through my head in about ten seconds. Why does my brain hate me?