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How Long Do We Have?

About the time our original 13 states adopted their new constitution, Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic
some 2,000 years prior:
 
    "A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist
    as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to
    exist up until the time that voters discover they can vote themselves
    generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the
    majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most
    benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every
    democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is
    always followed by a dictatorship."
    "The average age of the worlds greatest civilizations from the
    beginning of history, has been about 200 years. During those 200
    years, these nations always progressed through the following
    sequence:
            1. From bondage to spiritual faith;
            2. From spiritual faith to great courage;
            3. From courage to liberty;
            4. From liberty to abundance;
            5. From abundance to complacency;
            6. From complacency to apathy;
            7. From apathy to dependence;
            8. From dependence back into bondage "
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Professor Joseph Olson of Hamline University School of Law, St. Paul,
Minnesota, points out some interesting facts concerning the 2000 Presidential election:
    1. Population of counties won by: Gore: 127 million; Bush: 143
        million;
    2. Square miles of land won by: Gore: 580,000; Bush:  2,427,000;
    3. States won by: Gore: 19 Bush: 29
    4. Murder rate per 100,000 residents in counties won by: Gore: 13.2
        Bush: 2.1
Professor Olson adds: "In aggregate, the map of the territory Bush won was mostly the land owned by the tax-paying citizens of this great country. Gore's territory mostly encompassed those citizens living in
government-owned tenements living off government welfare."
Olson believes the United States is now somewhere between the "complacency & apathy" phase of Professor Tyler's definition of democracy, with some 40 percent of the nation's population already having reached the "governmental dependency" phase.
Pass this along to help everyone realize just how much is at stake, knowing that apathy is the greatest danger to our freedom.