Those who fail to learn from History...

[hanelyp]

... are doomed to repeat it.

Following a wikipedia bunny trail I came across http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edict_on_Maximum_Prices. Currency devaluation, scapegoating of "profiteers" and speculators for the resultant inflation, price and wage controls, all way back in the Roman Empire. Seems like nothing new under the sun in the way of economic mismanagement.

[chrismb]

The analogy is delicious.

In regards the comment on wiki ...

"During the Crisis of the Third Century, Roman coinage had been greatly debased by the numerous emperors and usurpers who minted their own coins, using base metals to reduce the underlying metallic value of coins used to pay soldiers and public officials."

... simply relate 'base metals' & 'underlying metallic value' with the issues of 'virtual capital' (e.g. gilts and collateralised debts, created by govt's and banks) & 'real capital' (generated in wealth-creating farms, mines and factories),

... and it goes without saying that 'minted their own coins' is analogous to 'quantitive easing'!!

[ladajo]

From my post in the other thread:

This has been true of most of recorded history. Tytler offers some evidence in his "Universal History". I think the best bit in summary is maybe his view of why Greece collapsed.

From the Boston, Fetridge and Company publishing of 1854, page 222, Book II, Chapt VI;

Such was the situation of Greece, when, extending her conquests and importing both the wealth and the manners of foreign nations, she lost with her ancient poverty her ancient virtue. Venality and corruption pervaded every department of her states, and became the spring of all public measures, which, instead of tending to the national welfare, had for their only object the gratification of the selfish passions of individuals. Under these circumstances, it was no wonder that she should become an easy prey to a foreign power, which in fact rather purchased her in the market, than subdued her by force of arms.

He has fun with the Romans as well.

[MSimon]

Americans of a certain age seem to be unable to remember American history from 1920 to 1933. OTOH Americans of another age (younger mostly) seem to forget some lessons learned from 1920 to 1945.

We are constantly relearning history by repeating mistakes already learned and obvious.

We have a cohort that is avid for gun prohibition. Forgetting that in America prohibitions don't work. We are not by nature a law abiding society. Funny enough the cohort in favor of gun prohibition is avid for the end of some other prohibitions.

I get great amusement from watching people crash into these obvious walls.

The common refrain being, "But MY prohibition is different."

“The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary. ” H. L. Mencken

And those of you familiar with human nature will recognize that fear most often generates what it fears. We don't need any special machinery like the visitors to "Forbidden Planet" encountered.

And what is the chief use of religion (those that are any good)? Teaching you how to live without fear.

[TDPerk]

" We are not by nature a law abiding society."

We are by nature a quite law abiding society, you're not just wrong, it's a wrong enough thing to be a stupidity. However, in first 130 years or so, give or take a decade, our laws were quite limited to what was popular to a broad super-majority, both at the state and national level. You may have heard of what occurred when a minority growing lesser employed its remnant grasp on power to reduce the effectiveness of the natural safety valve the jury represents, (ei, Taney overriding anti-slave juries in the North, in Dred v. Scot). This was settled at a dreadful price.

If you think something else was happening then (you or anyone else) I invite you to name the power the national government had in 1866 it did not have in 1860.

Ill laws breed contempt for law, and since we have since the rise of the Progressives enjoyed the proliferation of much ill law, and the more rapidly recently at any point since FDR, there is and should be much more contempt for law than would be ideal.

But then given the laws we have, contempt for them in the main IS ideal.

[MSimon]

Well all I know is what Jefferson suggested:

The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive. It will often be exercised when wrong, but better so than not to be exercised at all. — Thomas Jefferson

I think that spirit has been with us all along.

One should note also that the silent resistance to the command "obey" eventually brought down the USSR.

[TDPerk]

"I think that spirit has been with us all along."

Absolutely, however, this is no way discontinuous or even contradictory to our being a nation where law was respected all but universally.

Government was kept limited enough there was little law worth resisting. When, as now, this has changed, resistance to government becomes expressed as resistance to enacted law.

[palladin9479]

" We are not by nature a law abiding society."

We are by nature a quite law abiding society, you're not just wrong, it's a wrong enough thing to be a stupidity. However, in first 130 years or so, give or take a decade, our laws were quite limited to what was popular to a broad super-majority, both at the state and national level. You may have heard of what occurred when a minority growing lesser employed its remnant grasp on power to reduce the effectiveness of the natural safety valve the jury represents, (ei, Taney overriding anti-slave juries in the North, in Dred v. Scot). This was settled at a dreadful price.

If you think something else was happening then (you or anyone else) I invite you to name the power the national government had in 1866 it did not have in 1860.

Ill laws breed contempt for law, and since we have since the rise of the Progressives enjoyed the proliferation of much ill law, and the more rapidly recently at any point since FDR, there is and should be much more contempt for law than would be ideal.

But then given the laws we have, contempt for them in the main IS ideal.

The people who founded the USA and the various peoples who fled here were most certainly rebels and outcasts from their respective society. The very core of the Constitution and Declaration of Independence is that the Government is not to be trusted and that it's the duty of every citizen to ensure it doesn't become tyrannical. If that requires breaking laws, then so be it. Remember the people who made this nation were not US citizens but British citizens who decided they didn't like the laws of the King anymore.

You can't draw an arbitrary line in the sand that just happens to agree with what you believe in, either laws are allows to be broken or their not. You can't say "its ok to break laws I don't agree with, but not ok to break the ones I do".

So yes Simon had it right, the culture of the USA is not a law abiding one. It tends to follow the theme of "its not illegal if I don't get caught" or "the penalty for that is greater then I want to risk" instead of "I shouldn't do that because it's illegal". We don't follow laws because we want to, only because the risk associated with not following is simply not acceptable.

[hanelyp]

The founders of the US didn't declare independence lightly, but only after years of attempts to resolve their grievances with government were ignored and rebuffed. The Declaration of Independence is an enumeration of those grievances. Nor was the declaration by isolated individuals, but an organized action by respected men selected as representatives of the people.

[choff]

Shouldn't the ideal society be a place where the people do not fear the government and the government do not fear the people, at least then both sides don't have the overhead from buying up weapons and ammo.

[palladin9479]

The founders of the US didn't declare independence lightly, but only after years of attempts to resolve their grievances with government were ignored and rebuffed. The Declaration of Independence is an enumeration of those grievances. Nor was the declaration by isolated individuals, but an organized action by respected men selected as representatives of the people.

And where does the term "lightly" fit into the description law breakers. Again you can't arbitrarily draw a line in the sand and say "everyone on my side is fine, everyone on the other side is a law breaker".

In the end they were British citizens committing sedition and treason, the penalty for which is death. Had the not succeeded with their rebellion they would of all been hanged.

[ladajo]

Well, I might add that The Founders sought to achieve Independence as a last resort, and also in the most legal manner possible, in an effort to garner legitimacy upon execution.

They did not just up and flip the bird to the UK. It was much more complicated and drawn out than most may want to think. This also applies to both sides of the argument.
It was not all anarchy and law-breaking as some may think. If more reasonable factions in the English Parliment had won out, there may have never been a "revolution" and all that. It was a closer thing than most understand I posit.

[TDPerk]

There's far more to it than to say, the Founders were scofflaws. So much more, to say it is to betray a deep ignorance and shallow understanding of the Revolution that Worked (TM).

The Founders made the case to a very large political minority in England, that the King and Parliament were violating the sadly still unwritten English Constitution in passing their intolerable laws, that the American Congress' acts were thought by many in England to be legitimate, even the Declaration of Independence. In fact, the best consensus among historians is that many of the bizarre acts of ineptitude and sins of omission occurring on the British side in the war, were owing to the impossibility of finding British General Officers who were able and willing to prosecute the war effectively.

And you certainly can find a bright line to say, someone is criminal, or someone is not--there for example are those found guilty of a crime and everyone else.

"And where does the term "lightly" fit into the description law breakers. Again you can't arbitrarily draw a line in the sand and say "everyone on my side is fine, everyone on the other side is a law breaker"."

The foolish pretension that because other people might disagree as to what the truth is, that this absolves the individual of deciding for themselves what they will act on--this pretension is abandoned by the left as are the idiots who treat with them levelly, once they are in a position to impose. Then the left finds whatever bright lines those temporarily at the top of that heap like.

Rousseau crafted the myth of the General Will, and I thank God and chance alike that that concept had no effect on the Founding..though it has had it's terrible work done here in the last century, and the worse so in the last fours years than usually.

We should be so fortunate as to have such criminals as the Founders helm the ship of state in the future. We haven't had better yet, and are currently enjoying far worse.

[MSimon]

The majority, oppressing an individual, is guilty of a crime, abuses its strength, and by acting on the law of the strongest breaks up the foundations of society. — Thomas Jefferson

"Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual." -- Thomas Jefferson

[choff]

I've heard an argument that the revolution happened because King George III went crazy and started passing crazy laws, after he recovered he sought to patch up relations with the former colonies, though even he recognized American Independence.