Snagglepuss
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Hello all...first thread here (other than the one in the "Come and say Hi" Forum).
Here are a couple of quotes from two of the most respected Presidents of the United States:
"However combinations or associations of the above description [politcal parties] may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion…
“Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind (which nevertheless ought not to be entirely out of sight), the common and continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it.” - George Washington https://pileusblog.wordpress.com/2010/09/22/washington-and-the-spirit-of-party/
“Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant to step the ocean and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia, and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest, with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force take a drink from the Ohio or make a track on the Blue Ridge in a trial of a thousand years. At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer. If it ever reach us it must spring up amongst us; it cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen we must live through all time or die by suicide.” - Abraham Lincoln https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln’s_Lyceum_address
The question I pose to you, good reader, is this: Were they right? Why or why not? If yes, then what does the seemingly ever increasing polarization of US politics portend for the future of our nation, and how close are we to the fulfillment of this ‘prophecy’?
Here are a couple of quotes from two of the most respected Presidents of the United States:
"However combinations or associations of the above description [politcal parties] may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion…
“Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind (which nevertheless ought not to be entirely out of sight), the common and continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it.” - George Washington https://pileusblog.wordpress.com/2010/09/22/washington-and-the-spirit-of-party/
“Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant to step the ocean and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia, and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest, with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force take a drink from the Ohio or make a track on the Blue Ridge in a trial of a thousand years. At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer. If it ever reach us it must spring up amongst us; it cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen we must live through all time or die by suicide.” - Abraham Lincoln https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln’s_Lyceum_address
The question I pose to you, good reader, is this: Were they right? Why or why not? If yes, then what does the seemingly ever increasing polarization of US politics portend for the future of our nation, and how close are we to the fulfillment of this ‘prophecy’?