He was a tyrant, isn’t that enough?

Or do we still cling to oxymoronic notions like Benevolent Tyranny?

Sadly, i think Mr Bonsteel #2 is correct about humans’ power fetish. The enemy is us.. which was the insight that informed my decision not to make any more of us way back as a teen and has only been reinfoced since..

Face it: we SUCK.. why bring someone here who’s gonna either be crapped on by Wilsonian types and their fans, or BE a Wilsonian type or a fan.. either way it ends badly.. Starve the Beast – quit making cute, bouncey-wouncey tyrant-fodder just to keep you company, it’s not nice!

But later you note in post #32 a disagreement with the governance of 19th century United States given slavery, suffrage, etc. as being more or less better than 20th century governance.

The problem is that in post 20, you tell us to use historical perspective to a degree to understand the moral and ethical issues framed in historical context but later, post 32, apply modern moral and ethical arguments to frame your arguments against judgement of the period. In historical context, slavery, white-male voting, white male land owners, were very common and not so radical positions. The “radical” aspect of the period was the growing anti-slavery movement. This is partly why I hate discussing the Civil War period at all. Suddenly people become a “revisionist” when you abstract modern applications of morality and ethics in favor of comprehending history through the context of morality and ethics of the period. I’m not saying people shouldn’t be repulsed by some of the views, just that these often foreign-feeling views were far more commonplace and had some bearing on the thoughts and actions of the people of the period that we can’t really comprehend.

I’ll tell you where he was. He was on the radio and CNN shouting down dissent and calling anyone who criticized the Junior administration a terrorist. Watch how quickly the man will abandon his “libertarianism” (snicker) when team red is back in power.

Finally, on the third time, pollster Dick Morris told him it was killing him, so Clinton signed. So this great accomplishment was shoved down his throat, and he belatedly caved.

Don’t get me wrong; I’ll take it. Can’t see Obama doing the same. But still not something I’d count as “his.”

http://www.salon.com/technology/how_the_world_works/2007/12/21/woodrow_wilson_federal_reserve

“I am a most unhappy man. I have unwittingly ruined my country. A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men. We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated governments in the civilized world. No longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and duress of a small group of dominant men.”
~ Woodrow Wilson

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Talk:Woodrow_Wilson

But, anti-Fed sentiment is a libertarian view and is irrelevant in political discourse (apparently).

…why libertarian views remain largely irrelevant in political discourse.

Personally, I am very happy that the evil, corrupt, inept, and un-Constitutional state of US politics has nothing to do with libertarianism.

I suspect your negative ratings had more to do with your defense of World War I than your correction re: the Treaty of Versailles.

I’m calling bullshit on ‘Local gov’t tends to have much less scrutiny and therefore have proportionatly much more waste, fraud and “thuggery” than federal operations.’ you cite your anecdotal mayor evidence, but that directly contradicts the findings of Elinor Ostrom in her nobel winning studies showing small, local govts to be much more efficient.