Interesting food for thought.

[burniegoeasily]

You may have seen this, but it bares looking at to serve as a reminder.



SUBJECT: HISTORY

Thought you'd find this interesting.
At about the time our original 13 states adopted their new constitution,
in the year 1787, Alexander Tyler (a Scottish history professor at The
University of Edinborough) had this to say about "The Fall of The
Athenian Republic" some 2,000 years prior.
"A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a
permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up
until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves
generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the
majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits
from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will
finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, (which is) always followed
by a dictatorship."
"The average age of the worlds greatest civilizations from the beginning
of history, has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these
nations always progressed through the following sequence:
From Bondage to spiritual faith;
From spiritual faith to great courage;
From courage to liberty ;
From liberty to abundance;
From abundance to complacency;
From complacency to apathy;
From apathy to dependence;
From dependence back into bondage."
Professor Joseph Olson of Hamline University School of Law, St. Paul,
Minnesota, points out some interesting facts concerning the most recent
Presidential election:
Population of counties won by:
Gore=127 million
Bush=143 million
Square miles of land won by:
Gore=580,000
Bush=2,2427,000
States won by:
Gore=19
Bush=29
Murder rate per 100,000 residents in counties won by:
Gore=13.2
Bush=2.1
Professor Olson adds:
"In aggregate, the map of the territory Bush won was mostly the land
owned by the tax-paying citizens of this great country. Gore's territory
encompassed those citizens living in government-owned tenements and
living off government welfare..."
Olson believes the U.S. is now somewhere between the "apathy" and
"complacency" phase of Professor Tyler's definition of democracy; with
some 40 percent of the nation's population already having reached the
"governmental dependency" phase.
Pass this along.

[MattInNH]

Evidently you and kshunter are on the same email lists. He posted the same thing earlier today under the heading " Some interesting stuff from the last election "

[Aught Six]

Thanks for posting that. I've read it before, albeit quite a while ago, and I couldn't remember the author's name. I used his study in political conversations before, only to hear, "But America is different; we would never allow something like that to happen to our great nation." It's definitely up to us to spread the word to the ignorant.

[burniegoeasily]

Havent been in the political forum for a while. Sorry about that.

[akbound]

Hey burniegoeasily,

Don't be sorry....not everyone has seen that before. And it's been awhile for some of the rest of us. And just as the "tree of liberty needs to be refreshed" occasionally.......better still our "memories be refreshed" to reduce the need for the blood!

Thanks for the post!

Dave

[kevin1]

Good post Burnie ,
but I think that we actually live in a constitutional republic . I'll have to ask Hip to be sure ...