The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Ep. 200
At the end of the day, the magic that makes the American Experiment work is that it is grounded in an astute understanding of human nature and political realism. Almost nowhere is this fact more evident than in Federalist 51, written by either James Madison or Alexander Hamilton in early 1788. In this Federalist Paper, addressed to the people of the State of New York, Madison (or Hamilton) makes the case for the need for a federal government but also one with divided powers. In this episode of the New Discourses Podcast, host James Lindsay reads through Federalist 51 and explains its relevance to our “anti-Woke” approach. Join him to see how solid America’s founding really was.
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2 comments
You should be advising Reza Pahlavi on the formation of the next Iranian government.
I went to Brooks School with Reza.
I recently connected with a mutual friend from Brooks, Gary Witherspoon, and learned he had become an editor for the New York Times for a while.
Spoon can reach Reza. If you make contact tell Reza it was Chris Farrell’s idea that you contact him.
He might remember me. We often studied in the library at night.
Stranger things have happened. Be well in Christ Jesus, C.Farrell aka Legionnaire 1er Classe James Foster, but that’s another story.
The problem I have in all this is that the whole focus of it was to provide a better government, when government was not then (and certainly is not now) the only major organized group involved in domestic or world affairs. On top of this, insufficient safeguards were implemented to prevent criminal takeover (ponerology) of government or of big corporations (many of which, in those times, were already operating as criminal organizations).
And so now we have a federal government struggling within itself to keep itself honest, when it needs to be struggling within the greater contexts of world power to keep THEM honest. And currently, honesty seems to be losing and crime is winning.
“If we were all angels, no government would be necessary.” We will NEVER ALL be angels! And now we know that even if all humans could be turned into angels, that still leaves all the off-world players. And they DEFINITELY are not angels (even when some of them have pretended to be).