Let’s examine connections between the empires of Rome and modern US/UK/Israel to discover possible solutions to restore republic from empire in our world of the present.
Roman Empire: History teaches that the Roman Republic devolved into psychopathic dictatorial empire; characterized by oligarchic families competing among themselves for power and wealth within vicious inner-circles.
This occurred while proclaiming to the public that their government still upheld the highest ideals of their Republic, and proclaiming expanding empire was only and always in “self-defense.”
Emperor Domitian’s assassination in 96 AD (among ~22 murdered emperors), allowed historian Tacitus to write The Agricola, a biographical text of his father-in-law contrasting claimed virtue of Roman military and citizenry with the emperor’s utterly corrupt despotism.
Importantly, this text describes the problem of virtuous Romans within a psychopathic government, with responses between extremes of martyrdom to sycophantic servility. Tacitus describes Agricola attempting to uphold virtue; but without recognition of any evil in serving an expanding dictatorial empire. Tacitus seems to assume the ideal of mos maiorum, “custom/virtue of Roman forefathers” will eventually triumph over the evil of present “leadership.”
In Agricola’s campaign as military and political leader of Roman Britain to expand the empire to modern Scotland from 78 – 84 AD, Tacitus records a speech he attributes to Scottish rebel-leader, Calgacus, to voice how those of virtue characterized Roman empire under corrupt emperors:
It is no use trying to escape their arrogance by submission or good behavior. Robbers of the world, having by universal plunder exhausted the land, their drive is greed. If the enemy be rich, they are rapacious; if poor, they lust for domination. Neither rule of the East nor West can satisfy them. Alone among men, they crave with equal eagerness poverty and riches. To plunder, slaughter, seize with false pretenses, they give the lying name ‘empire.’ And where nothing remains but a desert, they call that ‘peace.’ – Tacitus, The Agricola and the Germania (analyses here, here)
Roman imperialists called Calgacus and those who preferred independence from evil empire a name:barbarus. This is translated today as “barbarian,” but its context for using unconventional warfare to oppose the most powerful military in its day is better translated in today’s language with a different word:
Terrorist.
Indeed, Obama combines these terms to call ISIS “barbaric terrorists.”
US/UK/Israel today: Current Middle East armed attacks are proclaimed by US/UK/Israel “leaderships” as self-defense, just as Rome claimed. US “leaders” claim to uphold America’s highest ideals of freedom while removing almost all Constitutional Rights, as did Roman emperors. American Founders created the US Constitution in light of Roman Republic design (here, here, among dozens), and aware previous republics had always self-destructed from corruption within their own nations.
US/UK/Israel wars today are not even close to legal, and based on lies known to be false as they are told. This is easy to verify for those with intellectual integrity, moral courage, and about an hour to see clearly in context what you already knew about war law:
US military legal argument for current wars: ‘Self-defense’ is whatever we say
Israel, Gaza and Palestine: What Americans Need to Know
Solutions learned from the past applied to the present: Tacitus’ argument was to wait-out tyranny in confidence public virtue of past ideals would triumph.
Tacitus was wrong.
A stronger solution would be critical mass recognition by the public of corruption in an Emperor’s New Clothes analogy, arrests, and a clear forum for whistleblowers to disclose the full extent of corruption.
In today’s world of tragic-comic US/UK/Israel corrupt empire, I propose the solution of:
- public demand for “leader” arrests. An arrest lawfully stops crimes.
- Truth & Reconciliation to encourage criminal minions to become whistleblowers so we can best discover the extent of the crimes waged by the 1% upon the 99%.
- With removed criminal oligarchs and corporate media who “covered” these crimes, we’d have honest opportunity for available economic solutions that would transform our beautiful, but historically dominated planet.
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/