democracy

This says a lot to me. Tyler (a Scot, I believe from the 19th century) was talking about the greatest democracy to the time, the Athenean democracy. He also talks about how democracies only last 200 years or so. “A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. . .[Eventually], the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public Treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy. . . The world’s greatest civilizations have progressed through this sequence: from bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage; from great courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance; from abundance to selfishness; from selfishness to complacency; from complacency to apathy; from apathy to dependence; from dependence back again to bondage.”–Andrew Tyler Fraser

I figure we’re somewhere between Complacency and Apathy.