Democracy?
Jun 24, 2004I promised myself I didn't want this blog to mention anything political, but I just want to save this quote somewhere I can always find it again An interesting note from 1770:
Alexander Fraser Tyler, in Cycle of Democracy said:
A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over lousy fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average of the world's great civilizations before they decline has been 200 years. These nations have progressed in this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; from faith to great courage; from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance; from abundance to selfishness; from selfishness to complacency; from complacency to apathy; from apathy to dependency; from dependency back again to bondage.
⇐ The Auto-tagger | Search work begun ⇒ |