It's interesting living in the last days of the Roman Republic

[xiphias]

We can watch our Senate giving the executive dictatorial and imperial powers, the way that the Roman Senate did.

The weird thing is that we've got them doing that for Nero, not Julius.

Comments

[sethg]

Hear, hear!

[navrins]

Any specific recent thing you're referring to? Because I've been saying that for four or five years now.

(Minus the "interesting" part.)

[sethg]

Arlen Specter, the chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee who made lots of noise about how the executive branch must comply with the will of Congress, has proposed a bill that has been described as a "compromise" with the President over the NSA wiretapping issue, but is more like an unconditional surrender. See here for details.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

I've been noticing it for a while, too, but it was Arlen Spector's bill which would give the President back all the powers that the Supreme Court said he doesn't have.

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

i wish i were gonna be alive in 200 years to look back at this.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Well, the United States has had 200+ years of being a beacon of enlightenment. That's actually a pretty good run. . . it's longer than Athens' Golden Age, for instance.

I still have hope that we're going to pull out of this -- we survived Andy Jackson and Richard Nixon -- and that we can give the Roman Republic a run for its money, as they lasted for, like 400 years or so.