: The Solomonic State. In the Bible we are told that King Solomon had "understanding exceeding much and largeness of heart, even as the sand that [is] on the sea shore." And his "wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the east country, and all the wisdom of Egypt." He was "wiser than all men" and "his fame was in all nations round about." He spoke "three thousand proverbs: and his songs were a thousand and five." He "spake of trees, from the cedar tree that [is] in Lebanon even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall: he spake also of beasts, and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes. And there came of all people to hear the wisdom of Solomon, from all kings of the earth, which had heard of his wisdom."
Now, I'm not here to dispute the Bible's account of Solomon's wisdom. But let us also recall that Solomon's rule later became close to tyrannical. His son Rehoboam inherited his power, and when the people begged for relief from Solomon's "heavy yoke," and instigated a full-scale crackdown: "My father scourged you with whips; I will scourge you with scorpions."
To be wise and prudent is not characteristics of rulers. In fact, it is very dangerous to hope that they may be. If we set out to find such a person, and have fantastic power available to him when we believe he has arrived, we have set up the framework for tyranny. The founders knew that no man can be trusted with power. They attempted to construct a system that presumed that men were corruptible, and that there would be some means to dislodge them when their corruption showed.
Still, today many people long for the Solomonic State as a means of dispensing justice. Unlike the Samaritan model, the goal here is not charity but the just wielding of the sword on behalf of the right and true. Thus should we seek out righteous men of learning and moral character who know what evil is and have the courage to stand up to it and destroy it. This model is what inspires this mentality.
There are many problems with this model. One man might be very wise, even the wisest of all men. But as F.A. Hayek might remind us, all the accumulated knowledge in the head of one person is still infinitesimal as compared with the wisdom that emerges through social cooperation on the marketplace. We can consider the price of any good on the market as it stands right now, and know that this one price results from the accumulated decisions of millions of people across thousands and thousands of sectors of economic activity spread throughout the world. The knowledge is dispersed in a million directions and results from small decisions and actions by economic actors. But the result is a single indicator that assists in allocating resources better than any single mind could ever do.
The model of the Solomonic State also imagines that somehow the social order we see around us cannot possibly have come about without a single will operating in society, some firm hand that has designed the order and keeps it running smoothly. People who think this way imagine that in the absence of this firm hand, there would be nothing but a Hobbesian state of nature, where society is a war of all against all and life is nasty, brutish, and short.
Our age is notably lacking in the likes of Solomon, and so those who fear the Hobbesian state of nature turn to the managerial state to act wisely in the interest of justice and order, at home and abroad. They might not always like what the rulers do, but they consider the alternative to despotism more fearsome. They warn about the dread results of anarchism and liberty, where people senselessly kill and rob without consequence. They fear this liberty more than they fear the abuses of power.
This, I submit, is the mentality of many conservatives and many on the Right. We see it in the affections they have for Bush, the Patriot Act, the war on terror, and how quickly people fall for any leader who uses Manichean rhetoric in defense of the latest nationalistic crusade.
What these people need more than anything else is a familiarity with the insights of the old liberal tradition as represented by Jefferson, Bastiat, Mises, Hayek, and Rothbard. They need to come to see how order is not the mother of liberty but its daughter. They need to see how society is harmonious not because of the state but because of the prevalence of human cooperation in the marketplace, where people work to trade to their own mutual betterment.
People who fail to understand this become the unwitting servants of tyranny, particularly in the modern age when it is so obviously not wise but stupid and violent and presumptuous. They imagine that the state can posses godlike powers and bring justice and order, but they end up only empowering the worst elements in society, bringing injustice, and chaos.
Now, you might say that the old liberal view of society is na茂ve. It might be in people's interest to learn to trade rather than steal but we live in a fallen world. If not for some overarching controlling force, people would loot each other unrelentingly and kill for fun. Now, to this I can say that it is true that some societies have not learned to make trading and peace significantly more prevalent than violence and killing. History is strewn with examples.
The question we have to ask ourselves is whether a society that fails to learn the art of civilization will erect and sustain a state that will impose civilization on the people. I submit that history also teaches that when a people are brutal and uncivilized, the state is even more so. The state is rarely and maybe never better than the people it rules; in fact, it is almost always worse. My friend, there are more ways to look at things in the past. Do you know what the American Indian was doing during the same time periods that you are talking about? Probably not.
If you are not going to join us and try to restore our Constitution, you are even more uninformed than you sound.
This is July 3rd and instead of going out and celebrating the signing of our Constitution, I am here answering questions, with the hope of getting others to see that we know we have been snookered since the CIA assassinated JFK in 1963.
Although at that time most of us had been convinced that the government was good and could be trusted.
I have found during my research into the staged events of 9/11 that it all started in 1947 when someone tricked president Truman into signing the law that created the CIA.
2 of the 3 functions of the CIA violated the Charter that was signed with 50 countries.
Here's the PREAMBLE.
WE THE PEOPLES OF THE UNITED NATIONS DETERMINED
to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind, and
to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, and
to establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained, and
to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom,
AND FOR THESE ENDS
to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbours, and
to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security, and
to ensure, by the acceptance of principles and the institution of methods, that armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest, and
to employ international machinery for the promotion of the economic and social advancement of all peoples,
HAVE RESOLVED TO COMBINE OUR EFFORTS TO ACCOMPLISH THESE AIMS
Accordingly, our respective Governments, through representatives assembled in the city of San Francisco, who have exhibited their full powers found to be in good and due form, have agreed to the present Charter of the United Nations and do hereby establish an international organization to be known as the United Nations.
http://www.un.org/aboutun/charter/index....
Now here's the link to the wikipedia for the CIA. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Int...
Can you find anyplace within the Preamble that states except for the United States. Our CIA has been and still is playing nasty games in other countries yards. Yet the Bush Crime Family has constantly used illegal means to extradite citizens from other countries and continues not to turn those alleged CIA agents over to those countries (Germany & Italy). And Bush gives a friend of his who intentionally lied about leaking the name of a CIA agent a "Get Out Of Jail Free" card.
The Bush crime family has pulled a Coup in the 2000 presidential election. Please read my blog "Was 9/11 really the Beginning". http://www.911blogger.com/node/9174
Please watch this 911 music video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVBd03ibz...
I believe that JFK was killed because he was going to shut down G.H.W.Bush and the CIA.
The Address he gave before the American Newspaper Publishers Association in April 1961 was during the CIA admitted covert operations in Cuba that began with Eisenhower and his vice-president Nixon, that were against our own laws as well as the international laws for 25 years. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAE... If you believe that they have stopped breaking laws, you must be naive. They just don't care about getting caught as much. They still believe that they are above the law.
A 5 min version of JFK's speech is at:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=...
The entire speech and transcript are available at:
http://www.jfklibrary.org/Asset+Tree/Ass...
Here is a link to Part 1 of 6 of "911: In Plane Site" about 10 minuets. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7zp-08Ax...
You can access the rest of the parts there or you can go and download the entire video for free as well as other 911 & misc other videos also for free downloading at: http://www.question911.com/linksall.htm.
The BBC reported the collapse of WTC 7 over 20 minuets before it collapsed using controlled demolition. This video shows the building in the background.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_oNhbsJ81...
The Bush Administration is only powerful as long as the rest of the world permits them to continue their human rights violations and continued treaty violations.
They must be stopped. Please help us save the world. As you said
"The question we have to ask ourselves is whether a society that fails to learn the art of civilization will erect and sustain a state that will impose civilization on the people. I submit that history also teaches that when a people are brutal and uncivilized, the state is even more so. The state is rarely and maybe never better than the people it rules; in fact, it is almost always worse."
Just check Bush's "Approval ratings" in the polls before you apply that to all the citizens of America. He is consistently going against the wishes of the people. Congress is in trouble because they have not been able to stop him.
Please don't judge us by someone that has control over everything including Justice. Did you have trouble sleeping last night? looks like an essay for school the "American experiment", as flawed as it is, is still the best attempt at turning the word "civilization" into something other than the oxymoron it is. Though God gave Solomon wisdom, yet he did not accomplish much. Between King David and Solomon, King David accomplished much more. King David is remembered more than King Solomon. |
