A lesson from Plato, on how Republics die.
[Update a while later]
Here I come to save the day:
Unfortunately, some politicians see the current crisis as an “opportunity” to push an agenda. They haven’t stopped to consider to what extent that agenda may exacerbate the very problems they are trying to solve. The WSJ captured the philosophy of the present administration in White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel’s remarks that “you never want a serious crisis to go to waste. Things that we had postponed for too long, that were long-term, are now immediate and must be dealt with. This crisis provides the opportunity for us to do things that you could not do before.” Emmanuel subsequently proceeded to enumerate a list of social spending items some of which arguably sound like new versions of the same community housing spending which may have been one of the original “political risks” to start with. When asked whether the stimulus package had turned into a spending spree, President Obama acknowledged it with pride. “That’s the point. Seriously, that’s the point.”
But that’s not the point; not the point at all. And it’s a shame BHO doesn’t realize it and a greater shame if he does. The real question is whether current government solutions to the crisis contribute to political risk or reduce it. That means knowing what’s broke before applying the screwdriver to the screw.
Well, it’s what politicians do. Too bad we have politicians, and not statesmen.
Solon is another ancient example we should study.
Among other things, Solon decreed that debts be forgiven, in essence “re-booting” the economy.
A macro-economic “Ctrl – Alt – Del”
Bill, I wish I owed you money.
Me, too. I guess neither Solon nor Bill understand the concept of a moral hazard.
I really wish I understood better how Imperial Britain regularly produced and promoted the governors and bureaucrats that consistently produced (or built from scratch) their outstanding colonies. The list of their successeses is impressive and first-rate in all respects.
I strongly suspect it’s the same reason England was the first nation to industrialize and produce rule of law and the middle class. Their institutional ability to produce and select leaders must have had something unique; something we (and the UK) are lacking today. I want it back.
None of them were the product of a late-20th-century public school system.
I really wish I understood better how Imperial Britain regularly produced and promoted the governors and bureaucrats that consistently produced (or built from scratch) their outstanding colonies. The list of their successeses is impressive and first-rate in all respects.
Conversely, my wife is a Filipina. She claims that no former colony of Spain ever amounted to much including her native Philippines. Off hand, I can’t think of a counter-example to disprove her point. The former Spanish colonies all seem to have high levels of corruption at every level of society, but she claims that how Spain ruled their colonies. Is she wrong?
Larry J,
She’s right – but only part right. Here’s a better thought experiment: find a successful non-British colony. Spain wasn’t alone in its failure. France, Belgium, Italy and the Netherlands also failed to produce any successful colonies.
Britain on the other hand succeeded in two different kinds of colony-building: “from scratch” and “convert the natives.” Their colonies in Australia, Canada and the USA are of course doing well, but so are Singapore, Hong Kong, the British Caribbean and India. Even South Africa was doing well for a while there, but the bush culture appears to have taken over there.
How they did that should be a very important topic of discussion for anyone who wants to colonize off-world. Britain didn’t build its empire through the work of a genius (like Ghengis Khan or Napolean). It was built by the work of institutions over centuries. We’ll need those institutions on other worlds. We need them back, here on Earth, today.
> Among other things, Solon decreed that debts be forgiven, in essence “re-booting” the economy.
WRT govt debt, Solon was correct.
Govt borrowing is pretty much a disaster.
If we can’t get govt to kick the habit, we’re left with trying to get lenders to cut them off. One way to do so is to let govt refuse to pay back what it borrows, better yet to make it hard for govt to pay back what it borrows. That reduces the problem to one of stupid people loaning their money to govt.