Is history repeating itself?

[Stormlight]

AN interesting article in the New York Times deals with a terrorist attack after which:

people made decisions that set them on the path to the destruction of their Constitution, their democracy and their liberty.

It's not about 9/11 but rather an attack on Rome's port of Ostia in 68 B.C.:

In the autumn of 68 B.C. the world’s only military superpower was dealt a profound psychological blow by a daring terrorist attack on its very heart. Rome’s port at Ostia was set on fire, the consular war fleet destroyed, and two prominent senators, together with their bodyguards and staff, kidnapped.

The parallels are eery ...

Full article from the NYT (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/30/opinion/30harris.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5090&en=c6ea4450122c3e93&ex=1317268800&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss)

[viscousmemories]

Interesting read, Stormlight. Thanks.

[MonCapitan2002]

This article is five years too late. The Patriot Act was the first step. This new legislation is the second.

[ManM]

I'll start worrying about this if Bush doesn't step down from office when his term limit is up.

[Stormlight]

I'll start worrying about this if Bush doesn't step down from office when his term limit is up.

You mean when it's too late?

[MonCapitan2002]

It already is too late.

[ManM]

I'll start worrying about this if Bush doesn't step down from office when his term limit is up.

You mean when it's too late?
We have a specific check against consolidation of power in a single man: term limits. Without an indication of that failing, I'm not going to worry about Bush crowning himself the Caesar of America.

[MonCapitan2002]

Those checks have been weakened by Shrub. His successor could very well obliterate what checks are left.

[Stormlight]

Those checks have been weakened by Shrub. His successor could very well obliterate what checks are left.

I found that this (http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:H.J.RES.11.IH:) and this (http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:H.J.RES.25:) is interesting in that regard.

[The Jesus Lawyer]

you can't beat bush and anyone who replaces him will just be a smarter version of the same shit. but you can try to be a good enough example to those around you, so that they too can see that things really need to change. if we all make change, things change and maybe if enough do it the rest will see just how responsible we are for the state of things. to believe you need to change others to make the world better is just what gives away that responsibility...and power. you can only change yourself and if you do a good enough job of representing what a decent person should be, you just might inspire somebody to do the same.

change can happen, people just look the wrong way.

the defeatist attitude is just part of the plan, more of the same-old.


michael :)

[The Jesus Lawyer]

oh and yes- i think history just keeps repeating itself.

[livius drusus]

The Lex Gabinia was pretty far from the first or even the most notable chink in the Republican armour. Long before then Gaius Marius (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaius_Marius) had his 5 consulships in a row, all of them profoundly against legal custom (although cover laws were passed to make it possible, of course). Those consulships were the predecessors of Sulla's extensive and bloody dictatorship, which in turn was the template for Caesar's more benevolent but just as authoritarian dictatorship for life, which in turn was the template for Augustus' emperorship.

Previously, the state, through the Senate, largely had direction of its armed forces; now the armed forces began to assume direction of the state.

Marius' anti-Republican consulships were specifically intended to staunch the flow of inept senatorial generalship, and it was Marius who recruited the first army paid by the state. Before him there was a property requirement and soldiers paid their own way. He recruited from the destitute of Rome, paid them, and kept them working year round (how else did all them killer roads get built?). Armed forces loyal to one general and out of senatorial control were a result of Marius more than Pompey, imo.

[Stormlight]

Very interesting, liv! :thankee:

[livius drusus]

The breakdown of the Roman Republic is a fascinating period, Stormlight. I can understand the temptation to draw parallel's with the US today, particularly considering the Founding Fathers had almost as big of a Rome fetish as I do.

The thing is, the concentration of power milestones had a lot more to do with good ol' fashioned fielded armies on the frontiers than with "terrorists" a la Pompey's pirates. The German tribes Marius needed his illegal consecutive consulships to defeat were hardly an amorphous guerilla enemy. They were an invasion force, a huge one at that, with a record of whupping Roman ass on the battlefield.

[Stormlight]

Ok, I have to ask: How about an article (or more) on Rome, liv? Seriously, that would be awesome!