I don’t know why it always makes me feel better to know that mine is not the first generation to experience certain situations. For example, here’s a quote from Cicero that I found in the comments on Protein Wisdom that fits the post-election blues mood to a T:
“Do not blame Caesar, blame the people of Rome who have so enthusiastically acclaimed and adored him and rejoiced in their loss of freedom and danced in his path and gave him triumphal processions… Blame the people who hail him when he speaks in the Forum of the ‘new, wonderful good society’ which shall now be Rome’s, interpreted to mean ‘more money, more ease, more security, more living fatly at the expense of the industrious.’ Julius was always an ambitious villain, but he is only one man.”
(Note to any of the new “O” generation that might accidentally have coasted on over here: Cicero was some old Roman dude who lived like two thousand years ago, man. Even before the first MTV channel!)
7 Responses to “Nothing new under the sun”
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November 10th, 2008 at 2:13 pm
I’m going to have that tattooed on my forehead.
Hey, I’m a twisted spinster, and anyone who sees the parallel between Harold Saxon and The One is OK by me.
http://proteinwisdom.com/pub/?p=2373
November 10th, 2008 at 3:03 pm
I think your explanatory note will make no sense to the audience to which it is addressed as they have no conception of events pre-dating their nativity.
‘Sides, you used too many words with more than one syllable.
November 10th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
Cicero’s in Illinois, isn’t it?
November 10th, 2008 at 5:37 pm
aelfheld;
Yes, sadly. What’s amazing to me is how quickly history starts rhyming. I am a software engineer, which is a field that’s been around what, 40 years? 50 maybe? Still, I can astound the youngsters with my technical insights, 90% of which consists of remembering something I saw done a decade or two (or three) in the past and tweaking the description to use modern jargon. The characters change but the plot remains.
November 10th, 2008 at 9:43 pm
One of the benefits of having the enemy in power is that it reprises all those great arguments against overweening government. Suddenly, they look a lot more interesting.
Of course when The Right is in power we generally need to keep the ‘lesser of two weevils’ argument in mind, also, before dumping on them too much. A lot of ‘principled’ people (usually Libertarians) tend to forget that when pronouncing ‘a pox on both houses’.
November 11th, 2008 at 6:15 pm
Thing is when Republicans (I wouldn’t describe any Congress in living memory as Conservative) are in power, they often find their principles less important than previously.
Libertarians are the flip side of Progressives – utopians willfully ignorant about human nature and society. Being a stiff-necked idiot doesn’t make you principled.
November 16th, 2008 at 8:37 am
“[I]t always makes me feel better to know that mine is not the first generation to experience certain situations.” Me, too, though it’s really small comfort most times. The idea that we’re not alone in dealing with “certain situations” does help, esp. if there’s a clear lesson or guide to what to do NOW.