Finished the post and made it official.

2 files changed, 74 insertions, 50 deletions

diff --git a/drafts/fall-of-roman-Republic.rst b/drafts/fall-of-roman-Republic.rst
deleted file mode 100644
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-Listening to “Death Throes of the Republic”
-###########################################
-
-:status: draft
-:category: faith
-:tags: politics, sociology, Rome, republic, power, control, myth
-:date: 1970-01-01T00:00:00
-
-I am sick in the bed, so I have spent a day or so listening to the Dan Carlin’s excellent `podcast series`_ “Death Throes of the Republic”. It is an excellent story.
-
-.. _podcast series:
-    http://www.dancarlin.com//disp.php/hharchive/Show-34---Death-Throes-of-the-Republic-I/%20podcast-Rome-Republican
-
-Excessive thirst for power
-==========================
-
-Dan persuasively describes overwhelming need for success built in every Roman
-man all the way from his childhood by following his ancestors as the examples
-of success. He described how every good noble Roman family had special rooms
-filled with the busts and pictures of their famous ancestors, how the similar
-memorabilia filled their homes. He claims that this made political success and
-political power the most important measure of success and personal value.
-I don’t want to argue whether this theory is right or not (which of course,
-I have no chance of doing anyway). I was surprised however by two immediate
-notions: the first was very personal and the second on the other hand very
-non-personal and theoretical. I will leave the personal thought to some other
-post, but let me write a bit about the latter one.
-
-If we consider this thirst for the political power the main drive of elite (at
-least) in the Ancient (and to some extent Medieval) times, it seems to me that
-one of the greatest inventions of the Enlightenment was replacing power with
-wealth as the main motivator.
-
-switch from power to wealth. But what if the thirst for wealth corrupts our
-republic in the same manner as the thirst for power corrupted Rome republic?
-Hasn’t it already? What if our republic is falling apart will follow?
-
-But that is not the question
-============================
-
-The question is not what was the fuel, but was the spark? Why what was
-supporting Roman growth for so long suddenly changed into something which
-destructed it?
-
-Structural problems? Why Senate have not managed to deal with the issue
-`Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus`_ tried to deal with for all those years (more
-than century)?
-
-.. _Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus:
-    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiberius_Gracchus
diff --git a/fall-of-roman-Republic.rst b/fall-of-roman-Republic.rst
new file mode 100644
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+Listening to “Death Throes of the Republic”
+###########################################
+
+:category: faith
+:tags: politics, sociology, Rome, republic, power, control, myth, EU
+:date: 2016-04-25T10:04:46
+
+I am sick in the bed, so I have spent a day or so listening to
+the Dan Carlin’s excellent `podcast series`_ “Death Throes of
+the Republic”. It is an excellent story. (Original draft of
+this post has been lying in my Drafts folder for couple of years,
+so I am now mostly re-purposing it for my current needs).
+
+Dan persuasively describes overwhelming need for success built in
+every Roman man all the way from his childhood by following his
+ancestors as the examples of success. He described how every good
+noble Roman family had special rooms filled with the busts and
+pictures of their famous ancestors, how the similar memorabilia
+filled also rest of their homes. He claims that this made
+political success and political power the most important measure
+of success and personal value.  I don’t want to argue whether
+this theory is right or not (which of course, I have no chance of
+doing anyway). I was surprised however by two immediate notions:
+the first was very personal and the second on the other hand very
+non-personal and theoretical. I will leave the personal thought
+to some other post, but let me write a bit about the latter one.
+
+If we consider this thirst for the political power the main drive
+of elite (at least) in the Ancient (and to some extent Medieval)
+times, it seems to me that one of the greatest inventions of the
+Enlightenment was replacing power with wealth as the main
+motivator. The question which intrigues me right now is whether
+this preference for wealth (where power is mostly a mean of
+acquiring the wealth, not the other way around as I believe was
+the dominant order in previous centuries) is also not something
+which is peculiarly Modern phenomenon. If it so, then it is
+feasible that it will also vanish with the end of modernity. I
+wonder whether we will return to the bad old days of the naked
+power grabs, civil wars and stuff like that.
+
+Actually currently I am in the process of going through the
+podcast `“The History of Rome”`_ and I am now in the
+depressive post-Antonine years of the real unraveling of the
+Roman Empire in the early third century, so my opinions are
+probably excessively pessimistic, but Mr.  Putin’s current
+efforts (propagated by his willing puppets in the Central Europe)
+seems like coming from this style of thinking. But perhaps, for
+Russia it is not postmodernism but rather rejection of the
+enforced modernism which they never really accepted fully and
+return to the mythical premodern times of the primitive Russia.
+Sad times.
+
+There is another story which makes me wonder in the Dan’s
+podcast. Why there was such inability to deal with the issues
+which had to be obvious for hundred of years, which were clearly
+threatening the very existence of the Roman Republic and yet
+nobody was able to deal with them well. One obvious one is the
+issue of the Roman citizenship. Why Senate have not managed to
+deal with the issue `Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus`_ tried to deal
+with for all those years (more than century)? I still hope that
+the persistent issues of our times which we keep kicking down the
+road (e.g., democratic deficit of EU, Euro area overreach, etc.)
+will be eventually resolved somehow. But what if not? What if the
+periodic unraveling of the southern EU will be persistent part
+of our life, leading in the end to the death throes of EU?
+
+.. _`podcast series`:
+    http://www.dancarlin.com//disp.php/hharchive/Show-34---Death-Throes-of-the-Republic-I/%20podcast-Rome-Republican
+
+.. _`“The History of Rome”`:
+    http://ahistoryofrome.typepad.com
+
+.. _Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus:
+    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiberius_Gracchus