Tagged: Thomas Fleming

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Humpty Dumpty on Idiots

I continue to learn the most amazing things on Facebook–generally the things I thought I knew in grammar school and had to spend a lifetime unlearning. Today, someone recirculated a meme with the old wheeze that “idiot” comes from a Greek word meaning private citizen who did not take an interest in public affairs, to which a libertarian–very reliable people, libertarians, one knows what they are going to respond before a question is posed–that the polis was everything.

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Matter Matter Matter, Part I

I am frequently asked, sometimes more than once a day, what I think of an article in a conservative magazine or some oracular pronouncement from the guru of the moment, whether the guru of the moment be Jordan Peterson or Bernard-Henri Lévy, Greg Mortenson (co-author of Three Cups of Tea) or Tucker Carlson, Bill Maher or Noam Chomsky.  When I have something better to do, I dismiss the question by saying I have not read enough of the writer or guru to form an opinion.

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A Brief Account of Siena, Part II

In Tuscany, as in ancient Greece, neighborhoods and religious associations played a major part in the organization of everyday life.  In Tuscany the church Parishes and the neighborhoods that grew around them, whether known as quartieri (quarters),  sesti (sixths), or (in Rome and elsewhere)  rioni  were the locus of many activities, including the repair of roads and walls.

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The Government We Deserve: Postscript

If we can trust a recent Rasmussen poll, nearly half the eligible voters in the United States believe the republic established by the mythical founding fathers has crumbled.  Predictably, Republicans are more inclined to this gloomy opinion than Democrats, and perhaps surprisingly, women more than men.

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Siena: A Brief Account, I

If access to the sea determined the future of Pisa as a race of sailors and adventurers, Siena’s location in the arid mountains was equally significant.  Despite the great beauty of the landscape, the fact is that Siena lacked water and was subject to serious droughts. 

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The Government We Deserve, Conclusion (at last!)

Suppose, per impossibile, we were to carry out an even more thoroughgoing plan of reform.  You can fill in any impossible details and requirements that suits your fancy.  Even if we were to gain the whole  world, we would still be left with a population of some 300 million clueless lost souls, without any skill or knowledge that is not technical, with churches that are the enemy of Christ, with a commercial culture that is more morally degrading than heroin and methamphetamines.