Guest Author - Cynthia Phillips
The United States may be considered a super power today, but what about tomorrow? Upon reading and researching about the decline of the infamous Roman Empire, it is quite interesting to see the parallels of our modern day empire and compare it to that of the Roman’s. Economic, political and social parallels from both the American and Roman Empires are what we will explore.
During what was called the "Crises of the Third Century" (235-284 CE), the Roman Empire had gone through an economic crises. The empire faced hyperinflation caused by years of the devaluing of their currency. Also, the cost of government including welfare and the military were burdensome. This sounds familiar in our nation as we take on trillion dollar deficits due to our welfare and warfare state and our children will be taking on this debt. And in our economy, our currency has been devalued because of the Federal Reserve printing money "out of thin air" for years. Ron Paul has been warning this nation for 30 years of this coming crisis and he has said that soon we will not be able to afford to fund our empire much longer with all this spending. We may not be experiencing hyperinflation yet, but it looks like we're heading there. There was a widening gap between the rich and the poor during the decline of the Roman Empire as we are now seeing the middle class in our nation suffering because of our economic crises.
The people of the Roman Empire suffered through an oppressive bureaucracy, the State imposed its authority on an individual's interest. The taxes and some of the legislative nonsense we go through should be evidence of our own oppressive bureaucracy. Laws and legislation seem to pass even with the people's opposition, just look at the unpopular bailouts that have passed. It seems that dissent is no longer valid to "we the people." Most Americans voted for a president in the last election to promise to end the war, and we have yet to see that promise in this current administration. Corruption ran rampant in the Roman Empire as it does in our empire.
Social decline also took place in the Roman Empire, the people had become apathetic to what was going on in their world and would rather be entertained and fed, hence the metaphor "bread and circuses." The great coliseums and amphitheaters were created to satisfy the people’s hunger for entertainment and perhaps an escape from their collapsing society. It is not any different now with our insatiable need for entertainment and good food. We have stadiums and television that fulfills our need to be entertained, and also all the different variety of foods we have now. As the Roman Empire was in the age of decadence, so it is with our nation.
George Santayana has said, "Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it." Are we those that cannot learn from past mistakes? I am most of the time an optimistic person, writing this sort of depresses me. But, I would like to think we still have some hope in this generation, especially in the information age where knowledge is at our fingertips. It's a matter of choosing I suppose...do I watch American Idol or read a book? "Knowledge is power" but only if you apply it. All I know to do as a writer is to inform you, will you inform others?
