What's happening today in the US is what happened to the Roman Republic. It grew so powerful that it no longer feared external enemies. So it turned inward to find its enemies and thereby destroyed itself.
If one looks back over the centuries of recorded history, one will find that ruling cliques and classes, priests/evangelists, lords and monarchs, have fostered ignorance and prejudice, and manipulated dogma for the purpose of consolidating and maintaining power and privilege.
The "conservative" movement in the US has always been associated with the "capitalist" element - looking to keep their money - and the "left" with the working class - looking to improve their lot - and so the dialectic will continue- and the pendulum swings back and forth as each side overdoes the situation.
It seems as it is either serfdom or revolution if there is no equitable economic balance.
The messaging from the "left" for the mid-terms seems to be saying - enough is enough - how much more do you want!
The message from the 'right" seems to be not that I will succeed but that you must also fail and be subservient. Better to reign in hell than to serve in heaven.
"The "conservative" movement in the US has always been associated with the "capitalist" element"
Not true. Hoover was anti-capitalist. He wrote a book against capitalism. The embrace of market fundamentalism (what most leftists mean by "capitalism") — didn't really happen until after the Second World War.
This was so insightful, MIke. You put together the missing lived-pieces I'd seen, felt and wondered about Reagan (and the others). This paragraph caught me and explained why my dad who was Republican, but detested Reagan. My dad was drafted-infantry in Battle of the Bulge, losing his buddies to war, then headed into Germany...
"Reagan never left the United States during the Second World War. He served in Culver City, editing training films for the Army Air Corps. He had seen the liberation footage. He had not shot it. Somewhere between the screening room and the Oval Office, the film migrated from something he watched into something he lived."
This is one of your best articles, hitting a lot of "there - there's". Thank you so much!
The GOP is quite literally insane.
Excellent. One of your best.
What's happening today in the US is what happened to the Roman Republic. It grew so powerful that it no longer feared external enemies. So it turned inward to find its enemies and thereby destroyed itself.
If one looks back over the centuries of recorded history, one will find that ruling cliques and classes, priests/evangelists, lords and monarchs, have fostered ignorance and prejudice, and manipulated dogma for the purpose of consolidating and maintaining power and privilege.
The "conservative" movement in the US has always been associated with the "capitalist" element - looking to keep their money - and the "left" with the working class - looking to improve their lot - and so the dialectic will continue- and the pendulum swings back and forth as each side overdoes the situation.
It seems as it is either serfdom or revolution if there is no equitable economic balance.
The messaging from the "left" for the mid-terms seems to be saying - enough is enough - how much more do you want!
The message from the 'right" seems to be not that I will succeed but that you must also fail and be subservient. Better to reign in hell than to serve in heaven.
"The "conservative" movement in the US has always been associated with the "capitalist" element"
Not true. Hoover was anti-capitalist. He wrote a book against capitalism. The embrace of market fundamentalism (what most leftists mean by "capitalism") — didn't really happen until after the Second World War.
This was so insightful, MIke. You put together the missing lived-pieces I'd seen, felt and wondered about Reagan (and the others). This paragraph caught me and explained why my dad who was Republican, but detested Reagan. My dad was drafted-infantry in Battle of the Bulge, losing his buddies to war, then headed into Germany...
"Reagan never left the United States during the Second World War. He served in Culver City, editing training films for the Army Air Corps. He had seen the liberation footage. He had not shot it. Somewhere between the screening room and the Oval Office, the film migrated from something he watched into something he lived."
This is one of your best articles, hitting a lot of "there - there's". Thank you so much!
Superb piece. Strong parallels to Christianity.