The Thirty Tyrants

Contact Your Elected Officials
The Thirty Tyrants

In Chapter 5 of The Prince, Niccolo Machiavelli describes three options for how a conquering power might best treat those it has defeated in war. The first is to ruin them; the second is to rule directly; the third is to create โ€œtherein a state of the few which might keep it friendly to you.โ€

The example Machiavelli gives of the last is the friendly government Sparta established in Athens upon defeating it after 27 years of war in 404 BCE. For the upper caste of an Athenian elite already contemptuous of democracy, the cityโ€™s defeat in the Peloponnesian War confirmed that Spartaโ€™s system was preferable. It was a high-spirited military aristocracy ruling over a permanent servant class, the helots, who were periodically slaughtered to condition them to accept their subhuman status. Athenian democracy by contrast gave too much power to the low-born. The pro-Sparta oligarchy used their patronsโ€™ victory to undo the rights of citizens, and settle scores with their domestic rivals, exiling and executing them and confiscating their wealth.

The Athenian government disloyal to Athensโ€™ laws and contemptuous of its traditions was known as the Thirty Tyrants, and understanding its role and function helps explain what is happening in America today.

For my last column I spoke with The New York Timesโ€™ Thomas Friedman about an article he wrote more than a decade ago, during the first year of Barack Obamaโ€™s presidency. His important piece documents the exact moment when the American elite decided that democracy wasnโ€™t working for them. Blaming the Republican Party for preventing them from running roughshod over the American public, they migrated to the Democratic Party in the hopes of strengthening the relationships that were making them rich.

A trade consultant told Friedman: โ€œThe need to compete in a globalized world has forced the meritocracy, the multinational corporate manager, the Eastern financier and the technology entrepreneur to reconsider what the Republican Party has to offer. In principle, they have left the party, leaving behind not a pragmatic coalition but a group of ideological naysayers.โ€

In the more than 10 years since Friedmanโ€™s column was published, the disenchanted elite that theย Timesย columnist identified has further impoverished American workers while enriching themselves. The one-word motto they came to live by wasย globalismโ€”that is, the freedom to structure commercial relationships and social enterprises without reference to the well-being of the particular society in which they happened to make their livings and raise their children.

Undergirding the globalist enterprise was Chinaโ€™s accession to the World Trade Organization in 2001. For decades, American policymakers and the corporate class said they saw China as a rival, but the elite that Friedman described saw enlightened Chinese autocracy as a friend and even as a modelโ€”which was not surprising, given that the Chinese Communist Party became their source of power, wealth, and prestige. Why did they trade with an authoritarian regime and by sending millions of American manufacturing jobs off to China thereby impoverish working Americans? Because it made them rich. They salved their consciences by telling themselves they had no choice but to deal with China: It was big, productive, and efficient and its rise was inevitable. And besides, the American workers hurt by the deal deserved to be punishedโ€”who could defend a class of reactionary and racistย ideological naysayersย standing in the way of what was best forย progress?

Returning those jobs to America, along with ending foreign wars and illegal immigration, was the core policy promise of Donald Trumpโ€™s presidency, and the source of his surprise victory in 2016. Trump was hardly the first to make the case that the corporate and political establishmentโ€™s trade relationship with China had sold out ordinary Americans. Former Democratic congressman and 1988 presidential candidate Richard Gephardt was the leading voice in an important but finally not very influentialย groupย of elected Democratic Party officials and policy experts who warned that trading with a state that employed slave labor would cost American jobs and sacrifice American honor. The only people who took Trump seriously were the more than 60 million American voters who believed him when he said heโ€™d fight the elites to get those jobs back.

Connections that might have once seemed tenuous or nonexistent now became lucid under the light of Trumpโ€™s scorn, and the reciprocal scorn of the elite that loathed him.

By LEE SMITH

Read Full Article on TabletMag.com

The Thinking Conservative
The Thinking Conservativehttps://www.thethinkingconservative.com/
The goal of THE THINKING CONSERVATIVE is to help us educate ourselves on conservative topics of importance to our freedom and our pursuit of happiness. We do this by sharing conservative opinions on all kinds of subjects, from all types of people, and all kinds of media, in a way that will challenge our perceptions and help us to make educated choices.

Was Texas Storm Manmade?

Another โ€œ1-in-100 yearsโ€ weather event in Kerr County happened next to a Texas designated โ€œWeather Modification Map of Rain-Enhancement Projects in Texasโ€.

The America Party Will Harm Democrats The Most

Elon Musk formed the America Party after an X poll asking his followers if they wanted โ€œindependence from the two-party system!

Democrats Exhibit the Dunning-Kruger Effect (DKE)

โ€œThe Dunning-Kruger effect is a cognitive bias where people with low ability at a task overestimate their competence, while those with high ability underestimate their competence.

250 Countdown

Those 56 intrepid men who signed put their very lives, honor and fortunes on the line. There was no auto-quill to accommodate their signatures.ย 

How the Senate Parliamentarian Changed the OBBB

An unelected bureaucrat does a important job in the U.S. Senate. Elizabeth MacDonough enforces senate rules on Trumpโ€™s โ€œOne Big Beautiful Billโ€.

Trial Begins Over Trump Adminโ€™s Deportations of Pro-Palestinian Students

A trial over President Trumpโ€™s attempts to deport pro-Palestinian activists began on July 7 with attorneys debating free speech.

Man Killed After Opening Fire at Border Patrol Facility in Texas

27-year-old man armed with a rifle was killed after opening fire outside Border Patrol facility in McAllen, TX, prompting shootout with feds and local police.

California Rejects Federal Push to End Transgender Participation in School Sports

CA education officials are refusing to end policies allowing transgender students to participate in school sports consistent with their gender identities.

Amazon Prime Day Set to Lift US Online Sales by $23.8 Billion

Online spending in the United States is expected to surge by $23.8 billion during Amazonโ€™s expanded Prime Day event from July 8 to July 11.

Trump to Extend Tariff Deadline to Aug. 1, Keep Rates at 10 Percent During Talks

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that Trump will sign the order to move the deadline to Aug. 1 from its current date of July 9.

DOJ, FBI Find Epstein Committed Suicide, Had No โ€˜Client Listโ€™

Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide and had no โ€œclient list,โ€ according to the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the FBI.

National Weather Service Fully Staffed During Deadly Texas Flooding: White House

White House press sec. Karoline Leavitt told reporters that the National Weather Service had a full staff on hand to handle the Central Texas flooding.

US Removes Terrorist Designation for Al Qaeda Affiliate in Syria

The State Department has removed from its list of foreign terrorist organizations Al Qaedaโ€™s affiliate in Syria, Jabhat al-Nusra.
spot_img

Related Articles