Tag Archives: decline

Deep Thoughts on Imperial Decline

15 Thursday Jun 2017

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Charles Hugh Smith examines the decay of post-America, partly through the lens of the late Roman Empire.

To these lists I would add a few more that are especially visible in the current Global Empire of Debt that encircles the globe and encompasses nations of all sizes and political/cultural persuasions:

1. An absurdly heightened sense of refinement as the wealth of the top 5% has risen so mightily as a direct result of financialization and globalization that the top .1% has been forced to seek ever more extreme refinements to differentiate the Elite class (financial-political royalty) from financial nobility (top .5% or so), the technocrat class (top 5%), the aspirant class (next 15%) and everyone below (the bottom 80%).

Now that just about any technocrat/ member of the lower reaches of the financial nobility can afford a low-interest loan on a luxury auto, wealthy aspirants must own super-cars costing $250,000 and up.

A mere yacht no longer differentiates financial royalty from lower-caste financial Nobles, so super-yachts are de riguer, along with extremes such as private islands, private jets in the $80 million-each range, and so on.

Even mere technocrat aspirants routinely spend $150 per plate for refined dining out and take extreme vacations to ever more remote locales to advance their social status.

Examples abound of this hyper-inflation of refinement as the wealth of the top 5% has skyrocketed.

2. The belief in the permanence of the status quo has reached quasi-religious levels of faith. The possibility that the entire financialized, politicized circus of extremes might actually be nothing more than a sand castle that’s dissolving in the rising tides of history is not just heresy–it doesn’t enter the minds of those reveling in refinement or those demanding more Bread and Circuses (Universal Basic Income, etc.)

3. Luxury, not service, defines the financial-political Elites. As Turchin pointed out in his book on the decline of empires, in the expansionist, integrative eras of empires, Elites based their status on service to the Common Good and the defense (or expansion) of the Empire.

While there are still a few shreds of noblesse oblige in the tattered banners of the financial elites, the vast majority of the Elites classes are focused on scooping up as much wealth and power as they can in the shortest possible time, with the goal being not to serve society or the Common Good but to enter the status competition game with enough wealth to afford the refined dining, luxury travel to remote locales, second and third homes in exotic but safe hideaways, and so on.

4. An unquestioned faith in the unlimited power of the state and central bank.The idea that the mightiest governments and central banks might not be able to print their way of our harm’s way, that is, create as much money and credit as is needed to paper over any spot of bother, is unthinkable for the vast majority of the populace, Elites and debt-serfs alike.

That all this newly issued currency and credit is nothing but claims on future production of goods and services and rising productivity never enters the minds of the believers in unlimited state/bank powers. We have been inculcated with the financial equivalent of the Divine Powers of the Emperor: the government and central bank possess essentially divine powers to overcome any problem, any crisis and any conflict simply by creating more money, in whatever quantities are deemed necessary.

If $1 trillion in fresh currency will do the trick–no problem! $10 trillion? No problem! $100 trillion? No problem! there is no upper limit on how much new currency/credit the government and central bank can create.

I love comparing Empire to Empire though I don’t relish the implications. Declining morals, debased money, unending wars, foreign invasions, rank corruption, mass disparities between classes – all have been seen before. Gibbon’s work comes to mind. Luckily, we know America is the indispensable nation, completely immune to reality.

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A Den of Vipers and Thieves

20 Wednesday Apr 2016

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Today news comes of a revenge 184 years in the making, a revenge that could only happen in post-American America. Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew has tentatively announced that Harriet Tubman will replace former President Andrew Jackson on the Twenty Dollar Bill as early as 2020. Lew made the decision after shock followed his previous proposal to knock Alexander Hamilton off the Ten Dollar Bill in favor of a woman.

Hamilton is safe thanks to a new hip hop Broadway musical. (Yes, post-American America.) However, he will likely be joined on the new $Ten by one or more famous American ladies. Might I recommend Bonnie Parker. Rumor has it Jackson will be relegated to a supporting role on the back of the new $20. Maybe they will feature a picture of his tombstone.

So, how is this revenge? History, my friends, history. In 1816 there was created the Second National Bank of the United States in Philadelphia. It was a private corporation set up, in violation of Article One of the Constitution, in order to expand government debt and power while simultaneously enriching the already wealthy. It was modeled after the failed First National Bank and in keeping with the central banking cabal theories of Alexander Hamilton. Is all this starting to make sense?

Earlier Congresses, while happy to illegally trade away their authority for easy money, were still more prone to banking oversight and regulation than their modern contemporaries. The Second Bank was not a complete sell-out. It was, however, ruinous to the larger economy the way central banks tend to be. It died a veto’s death in 1832 on the watch of ardent central bankstering opponent Andrew Jackson. Jackson, a blunt man, accurately condemned the Second Bank: “You are a den of vipers and thieves. I intend to rout you out, and by the Eternal God, I will rout you out.” And rout them out he did.

So long, old man. Slate/google.

Money returned to being real money for a time. Congress set the value in gold and silver and notes were issued and held by various state and federally chartered banks. This period corresponded with the most robust economic growth in American history. Only once, during Abraham Lincoln’s war, was the gold standard suspended – among many other illegalities. Most Americans, those not killed in the government’s wars, prospered. Times were good. Slaves were freed. And so on. Still unscrupulous politicians were constrained by fiscal reality and a certain small sect of leeches lost decades worth of influence and domination. Both of these maniacal parties returned to splendor when central banking made a comeback in 1913 with the passage of the Federal Reserve Act.

The Federal Reserve brought happy days back again – for them, not us. The people have only reaped two depressions (with another looming), the financial crisis, the S&L crisis, junk bonds, bailouts, the constant cycle of smaller recessions, blossoming federal debt, spending and power, crushing private debts, the collapse of purchasing power, inflation, wars, wars, and more wars, one idiotic government program after another, the end of the gold standard, the confiscation of gold, the theft of gold, and the near total evisceration of monetary value. Hooray!

All of these calamities were foreseen by Jackson. By vetoing the Second Bank he set the Hamiltonians (almost as cult-like as the Lincoln lovers) and the Rothschilds back by almost a century. In truth they had their revenge in 1913 at Jekyll Island, Georgia. Keeping Hamilton while ditching Jackson from the fiat currency is merely icing on the cake. Given the degeneration of America in post-American times, that icing must be particularly sweet.

Kari Winter is the director of the University [SIC] of Buffalo’s Institute for Gender. (Again, no need for colleges anymore). “Dedicated to advancing women’s and LGBTQ leadership, vision, and influence, the Gender Institute fosters workspaces in which each participant is stimulated to reach her/his highest potential and to increase knowledge and justice within the university, within their disciplines, and in society at large.” University [SIC] of Buffalo website.

Ms. (Mr.?) (It???) Winter praised leech Lew’s announcement as follows: “[Hamilton] is fully appropriate to be on American currency, whereas Jackson was a scoundrel, a slave holder and a white supremacist who was involved in the removal of Indians and was completely opposed to paper money and was horrible to women…” Her Institute is dedicated to knowledge, remember.

Yes, Jackson may have been a scoundrel – a temperamental man prone to violence and dueling. Then again, Hamilton dueled as well; he just wasn’t as good at it as Jackson. Jackson was a slave owner, true. George Washington was but they don’t seek his removal from the $1 Bill just yet. Jackson did remove forcibly many Indians. So did Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln is secure on the $5 Bill; I’m sure Ms. (????) Winter agrees. Lincoln never adopted two Indians as his own children as the racist Jackson did – such a white supremacist. Horrible to women? Lincoln made widows and vagabonds out of hundreds of thousands of women. Jackson fought to save women (and men) from economic destruction. Jackson also defended his wife from the lowbrow political attacks of his rivals – that violent temper at work.

It really all comes down to the paper money, to Jackson’s atavistic hatred of the evils of central banking. In a way it is fitting that Jackson should be removed from our worthless, private corporation-issued currency. By the way, whatever Lew decides on the matter, the Federal Reserve has the final say. In a world where mobsters run the economy and the government, where popularity and history are in the keeping of rappers and teenagers, and where a University [SIC] seeks to advance LGBLT (or is it LGBBQ?) influence, a man like Jackson is a misfit.

‘Merica. Google.

Let the vipers and thieves gloat; theirs is the long victory.

Trump and Circumstances

03 Sunday Apr 2016

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The Donald sat down for an in depth interview with Bob Woodward. I have a great deal of respect for these two men. Trump is Trump and, increasingly, the only mainstream, one party system candidate who makes any sense. He almost makes the idea of voting plausible. Woodward is a legend in his own time. He turned aside from a possible CIA career because the application process was too long. He certainly has the knack for sleuthing.

Here’s what the two hashed out on Trump’s plans:

The headliner is Trump fears a massive recession is about to hit and hard. I think it has begun. We’re overdue and the circumstances are right. In fact, this could be something we haven’t seen since the 1930s. Taking into account world conditions and where we are in Plato’s cycle it could be more of a 490s situation.

Trump says he will cut taxes immediately (never a bad idea) and eliminate the entire (on books) federal debt within two terms.

He wants to renegotiate treaties and trade deals to end America’s dual roll of World policeman and whipping boy. We can’t afford either anymore.

He wants high level staff to refrain from writing memiors while his administration is ongoing. By the way, I smell another Woodward bestseller.

He talked about potential judiciary appointments. He says he’s listening to the Federalist Society on that front. There are many decent FS people. I would know as a past two term chapter president myself. But, in that role, I witnessed the inner operations of the Society and Washington. I concluded this network is beyond repair – terminally evil.

After discussing family and useless political nonsense Trump returned to the massive financial bubble, under the economy like a supervolcano. Trump says he can fix the problem through shrewd negotiation and restructuring. The man is an expert there.

On the international front Trump oddly taks about disengagement (good) while simultaneously decrying the depleted American military (a tired, tired Republican topic). He thinks he will work well with Putin, China and other foreign powers. I can see that.

Trump’s potential problems are three: Congress (all that renegotiation and cutting must pass through them); the Federal Reserve (they exist to promote a new dark age) and; the American people (see below). Washington runs on debt, death and destruction. It will suffer no man, not even Trump, interfering with the party. I think at best Trump will delay or mitigate the consequences a bit while giving part of the country reason to chant and cheer. In plain terms he may be able to make the ending somewhat enjoyable.

The end of the America we knew has come. This is not the country I grew up in (I’m not THAT old either). One sees the signs everywhere, everyday. For example, I am a huge Masters fan. This year’s tournament looks to be awesome. As with anything I see the good and the bad. Yesterday, Saturday, I saw a custom BMW I8, a Ferrari, and a Lamborghini all on Washington Road. That’s a good sign. It means there is prosperity and high socity still left. However, this morning while sipping coffee and researching this article, I saw a squadron of Apache gunships patrolling over west Augusta. 

The helicopters are not in training. Like the sports cars they are here for a reason, an unpleasant reason. The military has been guarding (silently) the tournament for a few years now. I’m glad they’re here but it’s a shame they have to be. It’s a telltale sign of how bad things are.

If you join us this week you will notice a thousand or so police officers. For the most part they direct traffic, keep things moving and guard celebrities. The military is here in case ISIS shows up.

How the hell did we come to this? There is a web of dozens of reasons. I’ll cut straight to the primary one – us. The people, maybe a majority of them, have descended into a pitiful state of savagery, obesity, sloth and stupidity. It’s 496 not 1929. Those four traits run together but the (willful) stupidity is the driving force.

20121125-american-idiot

Google.

Last week Michael Snyder took a no holds barred look at how incredibly dumbed down our nation is.

He reports: “After two years in college, 45% of students showed no significant gains in learning; after four years, 36% showed little change.” Those are college students, the supposedly educated. 

Americans spend on average ten hours per day starring at some sort of screen – at least half of that is television. Some people literally spend all their waking hours with their minds abdicated to programed garbage. These people are alive but they do not live.

“It is not because of a lack of input that we have become so stupid as a society. The big problem is what we are putting into our minds.

If we continue to put garbage in, we are going to continue to get garbage out, and that is the cold, hard reality of the matter.”

Sad but true. If we really want America to be great again, we must ourselves become great again. That starts with living life in the real world. It can be difficult but it why we are here. We must rise to the challenge before time runs out. Tick, tick, tick.

Vote if you care – for Trump or anyone else. The circumstances are up to you.

The New Normal?

10 Tuesday Nov 2015

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I want to take a ride to the great divide
Beyond the “up to date” and the neo-gentrified
The high definition for the low resident
Where the value of your mind is not held in contempt
I can hear the sound of a beating heart
That bleeds beyond a system that’s falling apart
With money to burn on a minimum wage
I don’t give a shit about the modern age

I don’t wanna live in the modern world!
I don’t wanna live in the modern world!
I don’t wanna live in the modern world!
I don’t wanna live in the modern world!

– Green Day, American Eulogy, 2009.

What is happening to my beloved America?

Two days ago I wrote about the sizable cracks in the social/political/economic facade of my country. I found additional evidence yesterday which indicates we are headed for disaster, already having fallen off the cliff and just waiting for impact. All of this points to a coming cataclysm. But, what if it means something else? What if this, for now, at least, is the new normal?

Until the end of the twentieth century people lived, worked, earned and bought things. This buying perpetuated the working and earning. Very simple economics, micro and macro, really. Today things are a little different. People live but the manner and conditions have changed. Many work but do not earn enough to buy. Others are either cast into despair or paid not to work. Everything is paid in debt and/or fiat money.

The cost of the non-work alone is staggering. The current budget for the Social Security Administration alone is nearly $1 Trillion – about the equivalent of Ronald Reagan’s entire budget back in 1982. That’s over $6,000 for every job in the nation. When the great ponzi scheme tax was first foisted on the people, there were dozens of working taxpayers for each recipient. Soon, if things continue, those figures may be reversed. Can that continue?

SSA spending also includes, in addition to retirees, disability and other welfare payments. It’s a mechanism for buying off the unemployed. You likely know someone who collects a disability check, lives on it without working, but shows no signs of ailment. This trend and others like it (food stamps, etc.) are growing yearly. The new normal?

By and large, employment and the funny-money field economy have been “crapified.”

From the perspective of employees, the ‘crapification’ of jobs boils down to 1) low/stagnant wages for 2) highly structured, boring, repetitive and often difficult work. The decline in the quality, pay and upward mobility of jobs is directly related to the dynamics of globalization, financialization, and the surplus of ordinary labor and capital:

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The reality is that humans can only be pushed to produce more if the tools they’re using become more productive.

The decline in jobs and job quality is having a serious and deleterious effect on society.

The underlying pathology is not hard to describe: employers (enabled by the Fed which has since the 1980s been only too wiling to provide for higher levels of unemployment so as to curb labor bargaining power to keep inflation tame) have succeeded in eliminating labor bargaining power. That program has been aided and abetted by the popularization of libertarian ideologies, which encourage many to see themselves as more in charge of their destiny than they are and thus see success and failure as the result of talent and work, as opposed to circumstance. For instance, one group that could have disproportionate power if they chose to use it, tech workers (particularly systems administrators and key support personnel in large systems deployments) have never seemed inclined to find a way to use it.

…

Many men, in particular, have decided that low-wage work will not improve their lives, in part because deep changes in American society have made it easier for them to live without working. These changes include the availability of federal disability benefits; the decline of marriage, which means fewer men provide for children; and the rise of the Internet, which has reduced the isolation of unemployment.

At the same time, it has become harder for men to find higher-paying jobs. Foreign competition and technological advances have eliminated many of the jobs in which high school graduates like Mr. Walsh once could earn $40 an hour, or more. The poll found that 85 percent of prime-age men without jobs do not have bachelor’s degrees. And 34 percent said they had criminal records, making it hard to find any work.

Is this what we want? For the elites it seems so. There is an old saying you tax something if you want less of it and you subsidize something if you want more of it. Outright taxes, inflation and regulatory costs are causing less employment and loss of employment choice and quality. At the same time the government, Banksters and corporations encourage more unemployment and dependence and subservience via welfare, off-shoring, immigration, and a host of bailouts for otherwise normal business operations.

This is all insane. It’s demeaning and destructive. The working man lives with a system that hates him and treats him worse than an animal. He toils at a job he doesn’t value. It provides him little value. His employer doesn’t value him. He stops valuing himself, his dignity, his family obligations and his place in civilized society. Micromanagement becomes macro-destruction.

obama-economy-sinking-ship-political-cartoon

Google.

This is the new normal? I hope and pray we can break free of these veritable chains before they drag us into a collective grave. I pray it happens sooner than later. If not, I don’t want to live in the modern world.

Falling Empire, Rising Hope

08 Sunday Nov 2015

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Edward Gibbon listed various causes for the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Amidst his voluminous words one will discern the crippling effects of: military expansionism, currency debasement, massive public spending and debt, cultural contamination, and loss of character amongst the citizenry.

One who has lived long enough and with eyes open and awake will surely notice a similar trend in the United States over the past few decades. In 2015 levels of political or social excess which would have been considered a crisis in 1970 or 1980 don’t even raise eyebrows now.

In America today anything goes. Anything, except common sense, decency and responsibility. A huge percentage of the populace, probably a majority, has turned their lives over to the government and Bacchus. All of the deadly sins are on prominent display day after year after decade.

Leaving aside social decay, sloth, and criminality, the economic collapse is alarming enough. The old American dream of a home, a job, and improving stability is now just that – a dream. The new economy of debt, more debt and endless paper “money” is still wrapped in a semblance of the traditional America. However, the facade is beginning to crack and fall away.

Bill Bonner warns the funny money expansion has reached its end. The Fed and their employed fools in government have nothing left with which to prop up the ruins of the Superpower.

That flood of EZ money created the delta of plenty in which we live today.

Unfortunately, it’s not likely to continue, because funny things happen when you do funny things to money.

Former, honest officials in the know, like Paul Craig Roberts and David Stockman, warn the game is over.

In the last two days we posted the latest data on two crucial markers of global economic direction——-export shipments from Korea and export orders coming into the high performance machinery factories of Germany.

In a word, they were abysmal, and smoking gun evidence that the suzerains of Beijing have not stopped the implosion in China, and that their latest paddy wagon forays—–arresting the head of China’s third largest bank and hand-cuffing several hedge fund managers including the purported “Warren Buffett” of China—-are signs not of stabilization, but sheer desperation.

So it is not surprising that Korea’s October exports—–the first such data from anywhere in the world—were down by a whopping 16% from last year, and have now been down for 10 straight months. Needless to say, China is the number one destination for Korean exports.

Likewise, German export orders plummeted by 18% in September, and this was no one month blip.

The new American fiscal model depends on taxing profits and income to keep the funny money above water. It depends on sheer faith in a system of criminal corruption. There have to be incomes and profits. The system has to be faith worthy, at least at a basic level.

The rubber band of debt can only be stretched so far before it snaps. Families are mired in debt. So are businesses and the state. The phantom obligations of society have passed the point from which they could ever be satisfied.

The paid salesmen at CNBC and the idiot politicians still repeat the lie that everything is fine, improving even. Off camera they admit a tragedy is brewing. Thus, the occasional talk about reform. A reform keeps the underlying system in place, tweaking it slightly in order to artificially extend its days. A reform is temporary. We need something permanent.

Charles Hugh Smith hypothesizes that a collapse is much better than a reform. He provides plenty of evidence. A crisis which destroys the status quo works in our favor because it accelerates the inevitable. It moves us into a new and real rebuilding phase.

The reform quickly becomes “reform” –a simulacrum that maintains the facade of fixing what’s broken while maintaining the Status Quo. Another layer of costly bureaucracy is added, along with hundreds or thousands of pages of additional regulations, all of which add cost and friction without actually solving what was broken.

The added friction increases the system’s operating costs at multiple levels. Practitioners must stop doing actual work to fill out forms that are filed and forgotten; lobbyists milk the system to eradicate any tiny reductions in the flow of swag; attorneys probe the new regulations for weaknesses with lawsuits, and the enforcing agencies add staff to issue fines.

None of this actually fixes what was broken; all these fake-reforms add costs and reduce whatever efficiencies kept the system afloat.

The end of the Western Roman Empire brought turmoil only to a very few; it was largely ignored by the majority. And, it ushered in, or forced, the re-definition of the state, the Renaissance, the Enlightenment and the modern ages. It’s time again.

160924154

Morning is coming. Google.

The coming fall of post-modern Amerika, if allowed to follow its natural course, will bring a rebirth and happier times. A short time of shortage and confusion will really lead to better lives for good people, both here and across the West. Let the good times roll.

Fiddling While D.C. Burns

28 Wednesday Oct 2015

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Before he goes John “Boo-Hoo” Boehner has one last trick up his sleeve. It’s just in time for Halloween too. Speaker Dearest has been working hard with his best friend, President Obama (TWO parties, remember), to raise the debt ceiling.

burning

If only. Google.

The potential treat for this season is that the government is all but broke. Without more debt it will have to shut down at least temporarily. That would be a blessing for the masses but it will not happen. The monied interests need the government operational so they can continue to loot the carcus of our economy.

Congress has money, yes. This year has seen record tax collections from both individuals and corporations – over $3 Trillion. Such a number would seem enough to finance anything. Anything except our corrupt beyond hope political and financial elites, that is. Printing more paper money is their only hope. As they have slammed into the statutory cap on borrowing once again, they must vote to raise the cap. They will.

As usual a few dissenters give the pretense of debate over the matter. It’s an act well scripted. They say they will hold up next year’s budget over the debt. They won’t. This year they have side lies to entertain the people. Funding of Planned Parenthood is another holdup. Rest assured the rats of the Potomac care no more about children than they do fiscal responsibility. All just an act in the weary play of American Decline.

Little of this makes the news. Paul Craig Roberts just, again, explained why – the U.S. media is but a puppet of the state and its owners. They report the truth in nothing. Not our wars. Not our money. The World Series, yes. Anything of substance, no.

Your favorite candidate, whomever that might be, is silent too. They’re too busy talking about themselves and each other at present. Should the debt or budget come up they will only have platitudes. Their stated plans are a continuation of the status quo. Bernie Sanders Claus is the exception. He wants to give everything away for free. That means even more debt and spending. It makes no sense. Then again, the voters are not known for reasoning ability. A guy promising goodies from the sky just might be their man. No difference.

Whoever of this latest pathetic crop gets the job will do exactly as he’s told. The Banksters and the Treasury beaurocrats must have more money to keep the smoke and mirrors economy running just a little while longer.

Faced both with imminent collapse and the prospect of angry, hungry, zombie-like idiot voters at their doors they are out of magic tricks. Spending cannot slow for even a day. The Federal Reserve cannot raise interest rates. The slightest breeze could now topple their house of cards. And, don’t laugh. You and I live in that house.

Only more debt, ridiculous spending and more of the same will prop up the system – for a while. Eventually the bell shall toll.

Were an omnipotent and benevolent being with governing super powers to directly intervene, the solution would be so simple:

Rather than making a show, boasting to impeach its chief criminal, the IRS could just be abolished. Relieved of taxation the people could keep their money. By abolishing the Fed and its monopoly on funny money, the cash the people keep would have actual value.

Starved of funding the government would really close down – for good. This would free the newly enriched free people from war, regulation, taxation, jail threats, airport strip searches, bad medicine, toilet tank size restrictions, marriage mandates, travel and trade restrictions, gun laws, labor laws, electoral cycle bullshit and a host of other horrors.

Those other people, the ravaging zombies, could be placated by feeding them the newly unemployed and utterly worthless mass of politicians, beaurocrats and central bankers. A collective burp later and all memory of the past corruption would erased.

Sunrise scene

Dawn shall come. Google.

Ah, for a quick and happy ending. No super being will show up. Things will go on. The end and the solution will not come quickly. But, come it will. Some day all the things I just hypothesised will come to pass in one way or another. Rome will burn and fall. Freedom and intelligence will return. Then, it will be happy.

We’re Number One!

14 Wednesday Oct 2015

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I just published a story about the sad ending of one of the greatest men’s clothiers in American history. As sad as the end was it was fitting. Modern American men do not need nice clothes. They don’t want to look like gentlemen. They resent class. They are, by and very large, a mass of fat slobs. Our women don’t look much better.

As you may remember from blog posts past I used to be a fattie. With a little self-control and a lot of gym time I transformed myself from a tubby couch potato into a proportionate athlete. Of late I find it difficult to exercise on a regular schedule. Yet and still, by carefully controlling my diet, I maintain a healthy body mass. I only eat what I need. This simple concept escapes most Americans.

Modern Americans are the fattest people in the history of the planet. More than half the populace is overweight, a third are morbidly obese. Adults, children – read the stats I just linked to. Hell, you don’t have to read it, do you?

The other day as I motored about my daily business I saw a bloated whale of a woman waddling across a busy street. Perhaps 400 ponds, more than twice her natural weight, she lumbered forth, oblivious to the world, yapping on her cell phone. Like a fat zombie. I see this everyday, everywhere. I’m sure you must see it also. Pathetic as it is common.

I’m not making fun of fat people. I used to be one of them. I wish they could be healthy, be normal. Else, I wish they would spare the rest of us their repulsive visage. It’s just too much – literally.

Americans are the fattest. We’re also among the dumbest. We have the largest population in prison. We are among the most violent. This is paradoxical. Historically, heavier people were associated with a prosperous and civil society. Our society is overly dumb and overly in economic decline.

Ours is a society in decline by every measure. We are obsessed by the trivial. The important goes unnoticed and unattended. In most American States the highest paid public servant is a college football coach.

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Map of the madness.

I love college football. It’s just plain fun. However, it is sad that my team’s coach makes 25 times (roughly) as much as the governor of my state. My taxes support this imbalance, with obvious results. Mediocre football, monopoly subsidized, in a pitiful political environment.

Others notice the disparities too. Small business owners know something is wrong. Something is wrong. It’s what I write about so often here.

There is no political solution. No legal solution. The change must come from us. What will you do? Me, I’m going back to the gym. Back to the ring. Please follow me.

America is number one in all the wrong categories. It’s time for a change.

The Decline and Fall of Something…

28 Thursday Feb 2013

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In my popular Posse Comitatus column, https://perrinlovett.wordpress.com/2013/02/20/posse-comitatus/, I made a possibly confusing and unfair allusion to Caesar bringing about the demise of the Roman Republic and ushering in the Empire.  It seems that “crossing the Rubicon” is too simply of an explanation for what really happened.  The actual process from republic to empire lasted for decades and involved many actors in addition to Caesar.

The Roman Republic existed from roughly 500 B.C. until 27 B.C.  Most republics do not make it that long.  Ours, if it can still be credibly called a republic, is coming apart at the seams after only 237 years.  The Roman Republic replaced the line of monarchs who had ruled Rome for over two and a half centuries.  It was succeeded by the Empire, which lasted from 27 B.C. until the German Odoacer set himself up as the first King of Italy in 476 A.D. 

During the Republic the government was operated by a Senate (congress) and one or two Consuls (presidents).  Most public officials were limited to one-year terms.  Many of these public offices, including the Consuls, survived into the Empire, though with greatly reduced authority.  There had been a tremendous amount of political strife for over 100 years before Augustus Caesar (Caesar Divi F. Augustus) became the First Emperor.

Caesar (Julius Caesar of the first Triumvirate) returned from war and was expected or feared to take dictatorial control of the Republic.  He became a dictator of sorts, but he never got the chance to fully dominate the Senate, being assassinated on March 15, 44 B.C.  His murder at the hands of Casca, Brutus, and Cassius is one of the better known events of ancient history.  However, the conspiracy included dozens of Senators.  Allegedly (according to Tacitus?), once Caesar was killed, the chief leaders of the conspiracy called out repeatedly to Cicero by name, as if to showcase their good works.  It is also alleged Cicero waved off the acts and attention in disgust.

cicero

(Cicero, champion of Constitutional republicanism.  Google Images).

Many have theorized Cicero was a co-conspirator.  I don’t think so.  Marcus Tullius Cicero was a lawyer, statesman, Senator, and former Consul (63 B.C.) and is widely considered one of antiquities foremost figures.  His influence on Latin language is still felt with prominence today.  I quote he frequently as he was one of the most critical opponents of the Constitutional demise and all dictatorial actions.  He would be one of my two picks as the Ron Paul of his day, the other being the black-robed Cato.  Despite his constant opposition to totalitarianism, I do not think he would have sanctioned murder as a means to eliminate the practice.  I think his morals, nobility, and steadfast dedication to the law would have prevented his involvement.

Heedless of his own peril Cicero kept up his criticism of Mark Anthony and Company (the Second Triumvirate) and was, in 43 B.C., labeled an enemy of the state and hunted down mercilessly.  He was captured on December 7, 43 B.C. and immediately murdered by Anthony’s troops.  His last words (according to Plutarch?) were allegedly: “There is nothing proper about what you are doing, soldier, but do try to kill me properly.”  He was decapitated and his head and hands displayed publicly in Rome.

This brutal display of lawlessness and savagery was formerly utilized by would-be or quasi dictators.  Gauis Marius and Lucius Sulla had used similar tactics against their enemies.  Such horrific treatment was the most high-tech form of intimidation at the time, drones were still more than 2000 years away.

Marius served seven terms (at intervals from 107 – 86 B.C.) as Consul despite laws enacting terms limits.  His power was derived from constant warfare and the need for “emergency” powers from the Senate.  War and “emergency” powers go hand in hand with dictatorship.  If you haven’t watched the news in the past 12 years, perhaps you did, at least, see the three Star Wars prequel movies. 

Sulla served two terms as Consul (82 – 81 B.C.) and, like Marius, gained much power as a petty dictator through war powers.  Sulla’s wars were not confined to foreign enemies, marching on Rome itself in 82 B.C.  The Senate foolishly conferred upon him dictatorial powers for life.  These he immediately began to use, murdering 1,000s of enemies, with no semblance of Due Process.  Previously, the Republic had prided itself on justice and faithful execution of the laws, rather than of citizens and nobles.

So, you see, Caesar has a product of his times as much as a dictator.  His short reign came in the middle of a century marked by Constitutional decline.  Caesar is the best remembered name from the period though his actual power differed little from that of his predecessors and successors.  He could have done eternally great service to the Republic and perhaps changed centuries of history if he had followed in the footsteps of one of his ancient precursors. 

History also remembers Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus, mostly out of awe for his humility in power.  Cincinnatus was Consul and was granted dictatorial powers during a time of war twice, in 458 B.C. and again in 439 B.C.  Unlike 99% of historical figures granted such rare authority, Cincinnatus immediately abandoned his high position once crises abated.  Perhaps Caesar had such intention but was not allowed time to exercise it.  Perhaps not.

I hope you have seen, within this column, parallels to modern America.  To me they seem both unmistakable and also unmistakably dire in their warnings to us.

We currently have a President who, unchallenged essentially, claims the right to murder American citizens without Due Process.  At the same time, we have a craven opposition party which, rather than impeach and remove the usurper, propose to give him Constitutional powers beyond his office.  All of this, consequently, stems from “emergencies” whether martial or economic.  This has become an established pattern since 2001 though it has roots much older.

This year we mark the 100th anniversary of some of the most destructive Acts in our history.  In 1913 the 16th and 17th Amendments killed the States’ fading power against the central government and the Federal Reserve began it’s mission to enslave the nation (publicly and privately) in debt while enabling Washington to potentially spend without limit.  Around the same time the National Guard was formalized and strengthened, giving Washington military control over the entire nation. 

The ensuing 100 years saw an exponential growth in government, the decline of civil liberties, constant foolish wars, and the nationalization of serfdom.

Having recently lost our Cicero and Cato figures to retirement, we can only pray for a latter-day Cincinnatus.