(upbeat music) - Welcome to the spotlight. We have Mr. Jeremy Ryan Slate today. As our special guest, Jeremy is an expert. And I'll say that literally in not only in his, in his traditional schooling, but also just in his vast knowledge of the rise and fall of the Roman Empire. And so I think it's a really, really fascinating topic. It's very difficult for any of us to look at what's going on in our world today in America and worldwide, and not to draw some kind of corollaries between how empires have always continuously risen and fallen. And so this has been an ongoing thing, Jeremy. Welcome, welcome. And thanks for being on with us. - Yeah, thanks for having me guys. It's been a bit since we've chatted, so it's great to reconnect. - Yeah, it really is. You know, many, many great nations rise and fall. And we talk briefly in the warm-up room about the fourth turning and Strauss and Howe, and they talk about that as well, and trace history. And so give us an overview, if you will, of the parallels that you observe between our country today, maybe even go more globally, leave that up to you, or we could do both. And the Roman Empire. - So I think that the kind of the first thing you have to do here is you have to, when people hear Rome, the confusion to them is they don't realize that Rome is actually essentially three eras in time. It's founded as a kingdom first in 753 BC, and it's gonna be a kingdom from 753 to 509. And then from 509 BC to 31 BC, it's a republic. And then from 31 BC to 476 in the east, it's gonna be an empire. And the west's gonna last until, or I'm sorry, in the west until 476 and the east until 1453. - So let me just interrupt you. Can you, for our viewers, just define the difference between a kingdom, a republic and an empire. - So a kingdom is, you know, a monarch that's kind of in charge, but it's not gonna be a kingdom like we think of a kingdom. This is gonna be more like, you know, if you think of like Braveheart or something like that, it's gonna be more like a warlord in charge. Like, so if you think of that movie, that might be a good way to think of what your, your kings of Rome was. They were more just warlords with small villages, but we call it the kingdom of Rome. A republic is, it's not a republic as we think of it, which is very interesting. I think we have a different viewpoint on what it was than what it actually was. It really was just really in oligarchy in a lot of ways. There's, Rome has what's called the Centuriate Assembly. And the Centuriate Assembly would be what would create the major political offices. They're on what's called the Course Sonorum, or this was the ladder of political offices we'd go to, weeding up with console being the top one. But this was decided by voting blocks. So everybody, it's very similar to how the Electoral College would work. Everyone in your voting block, their one vote would then go to that candidate. But here's how, which is really interesting. Of the, I think there's 198 different voting blocks in the Centuriate Assembly. More than 80 of those were just for the Knights. Knights meaning people that had enough money to take a by horse and arms. And then above that were even the richer classes. Most of the lower classes didn't have much of a vote, right? So that's the very interesting part about how the Assembly was set up. It really was an oligarchy of the wealthy in a lot of ways in the way that the Republic actually function. Now, if you're looking at the Empire, the Empire is interesting because since the final king of Rome is deposed and the Republic comes out of that, Rome had a really big disdain for the idea of kingship, the idea of monarchy. So the thing that Augustus does, which is brilliant, is he takes several political offices and actually merges them. He takes the Office of Tribune and also brings in the Office of Censor. Censor was the person that could decide on morals and things like that and then also was responsible for counting. It's where we get the idea of our census from. It's the Censor would be responsible for that. And then he also takes the key general of Rome known as the Imperator and also merges that. So he brings the power of all these offices together and he doesn't call himself king. He doesn't call himself emperor. He calls himself Princaps, which actually comes from the person that would be the lead of the Senate, was known as the Princap Sinatos or the Prince of the Senate. So he takes this name people would have already been familiar with. He would think it's similar to like a speaker of the house role. So he takes all of those roles and combines them and says, oh, well, I'm just the Princaps. I'm the Prince of Rome. And that's where we get our word prints from. And that's why the first kind of iteration of the Roman Empire is called the the Principate after in the later Empire from 284 on, it's called the Dominate. It's somebody actually ruling as a king or as a lord, but he manages to kind of create this charade that there's still a Republic, the Senate still functions, the political offices are still here, but now you also have this additional office of this first citizen. So I think that's the really interesting thing about the Empire is initially people wouldn't have realized that they lived in an Empire. It's going to take quite a while for that to happen. And the fact that Augustus rules for almost 70 years is a big part of that because you're going to have people that are kind of dying out that remember what a Republic was like. And as you get later into, I believe it's like after Hadrian, which is in the 120s, you're going to have no more Caesars left and that's where Caesars actually becomes a title. It goes from being a name to a title. So there is kind of this transition to what a later an Emperor is going to become, but initially people didn't know what that was. - So, I apologize, that was a lot of words there. - Yeah, no, no, no, no, I'm fascinated though, because one of the things that comes up for me as you're speaking is that we have continually heard during our past election, our most recent election, that Donald Trump is a threat to democracy and that this is a threat to democracy. And quite frankly, if you study Plato, Plato was anti-democracy because he said that he didn't believe that that was a functional kind of way to operate. Now the reality is we are not a democracy per se in America, we're a constitutional republic. And so what's the corollary between Rome during those three phases and a democracy, if there was any? And was the Republic the same kind of Republic that we have here in America? - That's a tough one, 'cause if you look at it, the Greeks like to say they're responsible for democracy. It comes from the Greek word "demos" and the Romans like to take this credit for the Republic. So you're actually looking at two very different systems. And when we look at the way our Republic actually is, our founders saw Rome's Republic, but what they were actually doing is combining several different systems, right? They're combining a monarchy with, 'cause our executive was supposed to be somewhat like a monarch, but somewhat not, not. And then we also have the way our Republic functions is also fashioned up the Roman Republic. So they actually take two systems and combine them and also bring in some of the points of democracy. So it really is the combination of several different systems and it's not like just one. But if you wanna look at it, the problem with democracy is, and the Athenians found this out very quickly, it can very quickly go to tyranny because you end up the larger number of people vote for what is best for them, which ends up not being good for the smaller number of people and you kind of get this tyranny of the many. And a Republic is supposed to protect that, but once again, with how Rome's Republic was set up, it was, 'cause the voting classes in the voting blocks in the way they're defined weren't really equal. And I think that's one of the things in the US we've managed in some ways fix and some ways not fix, because I think the electoral college and the way it's set up is very fair. But then you look at the constitutional changes that have happened here as well. And in 1913, it's a very pivotal year for America. You have several things that happened. The first being the 17th Amendment, which now states no longer, and state legislatures no longer appoint senators, they're voted on by people. And that means that the Senate and the Congress have the exact same purpose, right? So you don't have that balance out between the Senate and Congress. And then taxation and the Federal Reserve and things also passed that year as well. But to me, if you look at it, that's kind of the year where America ceases to become a functional Republic and starts to become more of this like pseudo-democracy in a lot of ways. And the interesting thing about democracy as I mentioned with the Athenians, it gradually will slide toward an oligarchy, which is what we've seen here over the past 100 years with a very strong executive here in America. And I think if you look at it, there's really a lifecycle to this stuff. You can kind of see a Republic being the highest level of what you can have. That Republic disintegrates to a democracy. Democracy can disintegrate to an oligarchy. And an oligarchy can later become a monarchy or a dictatorship of sorts. And I think the problem is we're somewhere down the far end of that scale. - And that's exactly what Plato said. And I don't know, I'm a fan of Plato. And he said that democracy, and if I can really simplify, and I think you've said this in so many words, democracy is the mob rules. Basically, the mob rules. And a Republic is there's a set of rules similar to the 10 commandments or our constitution that we abide by. And that's what rules. And so there's a big, big difference there. And Plato was a big advocate of what he called philosopher kings, which, you know, I find fascinating if you find this kind of theory in the Roman Empire in any of those phases. But his whole position was because democracy degraded to the rule of the masses and also moved into oligarchy and, you know, those types of things that he came from his position that a philosopher, there should be a king and his son should be, should be schooled in philosophy and should be trained in philosophy and should be tested in philosophy and made sure to be a moral, virtuous human being. And then that person could become a ruler as a virtuous, moral human being, which is an interesting theory. And I'm not saying that I'm in alignment with it or in disalignment with it. But nonetheless, that's kind of where he came from. And I'm wondering if any of those phases during Rome in your opinion and observation were more in alignment with Plato's way of thinking. - Well, interestingly enough, I actually just noticed this today, if you get a chance next time you're on X, go look at the profile of it. I think it's President Bukele of El Salvador, his profile, his bio says, philosopher king. But anyway, he calls himself a philosopher king. But I think it's interesting, because if you look at that throughout history, like Alexander the Great was a guy that he wanted to be a philosopher king, right? But then on the need and desire for power, he goes way too far the other way. And I think we've seen this throughout history. And you leave and look at this in the ideas of, I would say more of the empire than the Republic because the Republic had this idea that there were always two people in office, right? These two consoles every year, until you get to like the 130s that this really starts to degrade until about the year 31 when it all ends. But if you look at the actual empire, it's kind of that old trope, which is the thing that the fourth turning talks about before that strong men make good times and good times make weak men, right? And then weak men make hard times. That's a lot of what you see in how the Republic or the, I'm sorry, the empire functions. You know, Augustus is a very strong man and more of a strong man and more of a philosopher king. His offspring, which isn't even his offspring because all his offspring manages to die under strange circumstances, Tiberius is not a very great king, right? He's not a great ruler. And then after that, you have Caligula, which is a terrible ruler. And then you'll have Claudius, which will come in and be stronger again. And then you have the, you go down the scale again till you get to later on Nero, who's kind of the worst of all, he's Claudius the stepson. So then you've got another guy that comes in Vespasian. Vespasian is very strong. He has a strong son, but then also has a very weak son, which is Domitian. So you do see this, this idea of the people that create the good times aren't the ones that make it last. So you even look at Edward Gibbon and the clan and fall of the Roman Empire puts a lot of credit on comedists for the actual real decline in Rome, because it's his being emperor that actually creates a new system because things get so bad. And Marcus Aurelius was a great ruler. He was very much a philosopher king, but he has this kid that's just not such a great ruler who's comedists. And there is so much hatred for comedists that the Praetorian Guard kills him in 192. And it's gonna create a whole new way that the empire actually functions and it functions by the sword and by power. And that's what you get in the third century, what are called these Beric emperors. So I think it's a very interesting point you raise that these philosopher king types that are strong and fair and whatever they might be create good times, but the problem is unless they're also bringing others into their way of thought, they're going to create good times that don't last. The Marcus Aurelius is the last of what are called the five good emperors. And the thing that's different about the five good emperors versus any other time in Roman history, because even Augustus fails to do this with the Giulio Claudians, is they don't take their actual like human born son. They take the closest qualified person to them and adopt them because you could adopt a full adult in Rome and they name that person their successor. So because of that you have from 90, I believe it's 98 until Commodus who takes power in 180 of this very good empire where things are going very well. And it's these five different rulers that they find the next qualified person next to them. You have Nerva first followed by Trajan followed by Hadrian followed by Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius. So like it really creates this good quality of time, but then Aurelius does a terrible thing of like, okay, well, I know it worked really well of getting the closest qualified person, but I've been such a good dad and philosopher to my kid Commodus, it's a good idea to put him in charge. And that ends up being the major thing that Gibbon says that is the thing that causes the downward slide. - So what would it be fair to say that? - So is Trump doing that? (laughing) - Is Trump creating the good times and then it's all gonna go to hell again? - We've got a lot to fix though. That's the problem is I feel like we're kind of at the end of, I don't really know where to put us 'cause I've been talking a lot about this year about the third century crisis of Rome. And if you look at the thing we don't have in the third century crisis is we don't have governors raising armies and attacking each other and declaring themselves president. We don't have that happening. But that was one of the major things happening in the third century. The thing we do have is we have out of control immigration coming in from the borders. Like they did in Rome in that period of time. And then we also have inflation which is out of control. And the problem is, is one of those makes the other worse. The more immigration you have, the more inflation there is. If that immigration isn't producing for the gross domestic product. So that's what I've been talking about over the last year that I see. And then Trump comes in and I think things can improve for a time, but the problem is guys, unless we fix the currency, we're not going any place good. That's why I like that he's talking about tariffs because it starts to recover business here. Which is important, right? Because if you're gonna go get back to a strong currency, you have to do that. But our currency also needs to be based on something. Which that's one of the major things that Constantine does, I believe around 314 is he actually gets the Eastern Roman Empire on a gold standard. And that's one of the major things that saves the east is that they have this really good hard currency. The west doesn't have that. So in addition to poor rule and barbarian invasions and things like that, they don't have money that really matters. So unless we handle that, we're gonna go the same way of the Western Roman Empire, not the way of the Eastern Roman Empire. - So what's the solution on that? That started, I mean, obviously that started back in 1913 with the re-institution of the Third Federal Reserve. And then in '73, I believe it was Nixon or '71. Nixon took us off the gold standard and it's kind of gone nuts ever since. And it's gone way more insane in the last four years than it has any time previously. I think I don't quote me exactly on this, but it took us 20 years to get as much debt as we got in the last four years in America. And so it's pretty crazy. What is the solution? Can Constantine help us here? - You know, believe it or not, I think Argentina is the solution here. Because if you look at what Millet has done in Argentina, they were at 17,000% inflation when he took office. 17,000% and in 284 the Roman Empire was at 15,000%. So Argentina was doing a lot worse and doesn't have as much territory and as much industry as Roman did in that period of time. And you don't quote me on this, but the last I heard, he's got it down to like 4% inflation from 17,000% and he did it in a period of six months. And the way he did it is one of the things that Trump is looking at doing. It's exactly what he's gonna have Musk and Vivek Ramaswami doing, which is slashing government spending. If you guys have seen the video, there's a video of him and he's got this giant whiteboard and he's just like, "Gone, gone, gone, gone." And that's the thing we have to really handle is if we can start slashing government spending, like it's not about, Vivek Post has something about this yesterday. It's not about using, oh gosh, how did he say this? Like at first it's about demolishing things. It's not about using a scalpel, right? You can kind of shape things a little bit later on, but we need to whole piece remove things because our budget is just too bloated. So I think if we can start there and we can really start removing things that's good, now here's the problem that I don't fully understand is what are the constitutional limitations on doing that? How much involvement does Congress have to have? Because you even look at, he wanted to nominate Matt Gates in the Senate was like, nope, we're not gonna let him go through. So I think this is something that's going to have to get figured out is that in order for that type of slashing to happen, you need full support from Congress and full support from the Senate to be able to actually do it. - I just got to say this and I could be totally wrong, but I think Trump is playing chess and I'm not sure that he planned on putting Matt Gates there. I think he has plans for Matt Gates and the woman's name who's in there now slips me, but do you remember her name? - It was Pam Bondi. She was the former attorney general of Florida. - Yeah, everything I've seen about her, she's pretty tough and she's gonna be ready to go. So we haven't heard the last from Gates, but there are many things that he can do that don't have to be approved by Congress. So anyway, just as a parenthetical, we'll see. I tend to think Trump is pretty smart in his chess moves and his art of war, if you will. And so I think we're gonna see more of Gates. - I hope so, 'cause I like him a lot and I think the thing that I like the most is how much he terrifies other people. You know what I mean? I think that's been the thing about Trump. As much as he terrifies both political parties, you're like, oh, we need that guy in there. So I do think there's, because one of the big things that Gates has really hit on is the trading of stocks and things like that in Congress. If you have people passing laws that they're gonna economically benefit from, well, what laws are they gonna pass? And I think that's one of the major problems we have right now is everybody's got their hands and the cookie jar, so they're just passing the next bill and the country has no money to do these things. - Right, yeah. And if you look at the multiple tens of millions of dollars, 20s of millions that people in Congress are worth and compared to their salaries, the numbers don't pencil out, there's something nefarious going on there. That's pretty obvious. - Seriously, and once again, that becomes the problem when the people responsible for passing the laws and also like, quote unquote, guarding the republic are the ones bringing its downfall, well, that's a real problem. That's why I'm excited about Trump getting back in because both parties hate him equally. And to me, I think that's a great thing. (laughs) - I do too. That's a good signal that somebody's doing good things just like you said about Gates. We've just got to say our prayers and keep him alive until he gets into the office because the forces of evil do not roll over easily. And there's still, I mean, this whole thing, and I'm getting off on a tangent here, but I'm sure you can roll with it. It doesn't necessarily have to do with the Roman Empire. Maybe it does, but the fact that Biden and Harris approved long-range U.S. missiles to be used and against Russia in what? The last six weeks of in an office, it's pretty obvious what's going on. They're wanting to hand over war to Trump. They're going to want to hand over a crashed economy. And I'm wondering is there anything history can teach us about people who inherited those type of things? - Well, I think that's an interesting position to be in because what's happening is the military industrial complex is trying to create something that they're going to continue to benefit off of economically. And they want to put Trump in a position that's a war he can't get rid of. And I think one of the things that we really need to look at, though it's not an exact parallel, it's more of a parallel to the war on terror, is you look at the Punic Wars and what that did to Rome. If the Punic Wars, which happened around the mid-second century B.C., they militarized the entire Roman state against Carthage. So every move became important to what were they going to do to Carthage to the point that Pliny the Elder was ending every speech with Carthago de Lenda est, or Carthage must be destroyed. Even if it had nothing to do with Carthage. So the entire state was becoming militarized against one group. Well, what happens when you have something like that, it creates emergencies where you can have solutions which you wouldn't have during times of freedom. And I think that's what we're really looking at here because you even look at since 9/11, we're still in a state of emergency. That state of emergency still exists and it allows, if that state of emergency didn't exist, there's parts of homeland security that wouldn't be constitutional. So it's the fact that that gets renewed every single year that allows us to continue doing those things. And wars are very, very handy for people that wanna do things to you that they can't do to you during times of peace. 'Cause you even look at during Wilson, if you look into the alien sedition laws. The alien sedition or the alien sedition acts. He passed these two acts to basically jail anyone that spoke out against the First World War. That's a huge problem, but it's a ton of power and something that he was able to actually do. And so these are things you have to consider of what does war do for the ability of the powers that be to do things to you. - Yes, it's, it's pure evil. I can't say it any other way. Speaking of evil, what, what impact did the, the degradation of morality have upon the Roman Empire and the fall of the Empire? Because we're certainly seeing a huge degradation of morality in our world today. - Well, I think the thing you have to look at is the East, the Western Empire falls in 476, but you have to look at really the third century AD. So we're looking at around like the year, kind of like right before that's like 192 to like 378. So it's like this kind of 200 year period. During this time, Rome was a peak, was still a pagan nation. And a lot of the damage that was done to Rome was done during this time, though it's going to be by three, by three 78, it's a Christian country. But by that point in time, kind of things are too far down the road to save it, if that makes sense. You have in the two 50s, Emperor Decius, because he's terrified of climate change, he's going to start requiring people to make sacrifices to the gods every year, which is one of the major reasons they start going after Christians is in the two 50s. So a lot of these things that they think are going to save them are things that make the situation worse. So if you want to look at when things get bad, it's the second century. There's a guy in the 220s named Eligabalus. And he's a very interesting character if you ever get time to look into Eligabalus. There's two different names, Eligabalus or Heliogabalus. He's a teenager that's the priest of a cult of Eligabal. They worship the sun god. And he comes into Rome and he has this conical black rock, which symbolizes his god. He has a wedding for this rock to another black rock. And everyone has to come to the wedding. He's pulled around in a chariot of press. - It's a black rock that controls the whole world right now, right? - I've had that conversation because I'm like, isn't that interesting? But anyway. - It's fascinating. - Anyway, but he's pulled around in a chariot of prostitutes. He marries a vestal virgin because that was something you weren't supposed to do. They're vestal virgins for a reason. He puts his hairdresser in charge of Rome's grain supply. He also, I'm trying to think of a nice way to say this. He advances men in political office by the size of their member. I guess it's an easy way to explain this. So they get to that point and he's so over the top that he's actually killed by the Praetorian Guard and replaced. So if you wanna look at how bad things get, that's how bad things get. Now it gets better under Constantine after like 3.12. But by that point in time, there's too much inflation. There's too much immigration off the borders. And by that point in time, Rome had already split into East and West. Constantine is not the last, but one of the last emperors to rule a united empire. And what's going to happen is the power center just naturally goes East toward Constantinople. So what's kind of left of the hulk of Rome because Rome ceases to really be the capital city after Diocletian in about 305, Milan is actually gonna become the main power center of the Western empire. So that's really what happens. There's so much damage done during this time of degradation that though things do get better, they've already done too much wrong, if that makes sense. - Yeah. - So there is a point of no return. - Correct. And that's what happened for the Western empire, which the Eastern empire already got off on a better foot because it breaks in the two eighties and it becomes more of a, it really has more of a Christian center, if that makes sense. - So do you see that happening for the United States? Splitting? - That's tough to go with. I don't know honestly because the problem is, is I don't think the US could survive split up because you're going to have other countries coming in and trying to take parts of it. So I think in order to continue to survive, we have to figure out how to get along together and we have to figure out how to heal these fractures because as one body, I don't think the states are powerful enough. That's why we're set up and the way we're set up, right? We have these individual states but we have a federal government so that we can cooperate on things internationally. So unless we can fix that, I think we're in trouble. - Well, I don't know if you've heard but Newsome has already threatened he's going to leave if he's forced to take the illegals out under Trump in the state of California. Now it could, he could just be born. - It's bankrupt anyway. So is it that big of a loss and the guy looks like a Batman villain? - You know, yeah. He looks exactly like a Batman villain or a big preacher in Houston, Texas who will remain nameless. But nonetheless, I saw a map where they brought Canada down the east or the west coast and encompassed California. And then they came over and encompassed New York and the post was, does anyone have any problem with this? And they were part of Canada. - New Jersey. I kind of do have a problem with this. I would like to stay here. (laughing) - Let's go back to Constantine because you mentioned that it was converted to Christianity. Was it really? - Because here's, let me- - Yes and now. - Yeah, let me tell you my interpretation and you can correct me if I'm wrong. But Constantine was a worshiper of soul and victus and that was a pagan god. And he was getting pummeled in battle from what I've understood. Famines, plagues, battles. And he quickly converted to Christianity and put crosses on his shields and then they won the war. So it really seemed like a political move to me. What are your thoughts on that? - It's tough 'cause it's like there's the doctrine of it and then what I actually believe historically looking at it because if you historically look at it, he'd been a supporter of soul and victus in his entire life. And soul and victus is something that had really come out of the military. It comes out of the military, belief through Syria. I believe is where it gets picked up. It starts in the two seventies under a really end and his father, Constantius, is gonna pick it up and then through Constantius is gonna make its way to Constantine. So that's, it's tough. And I guess the thing you have to consider is the Roman emperor is, well, let's back this up a little bit 'cause I think to make this make sense to people you have to understand what Rome is as an actual like political and religious state. If you look at kind of our modern world, like separation of church and state is a thing, right? In Rome it wasn't. There was no separation between political power and temporal power. And there's this letter from, I believe it's plenty the younger to Emperor Vespasian in the, somewhere in the seventies AD where he's trying to explain Christians to the Roman emperor. And the Roman emperor just really didn't quite understand. He's like, you know, there's these people and they eat their God and what else does he say? 'Cause once again, they don't understand transubstantiation, but he's trying to explain that. And he also says, and they weren't worshiped the emperor and they really don't understand why because to Romans, they would bring in gods from other places. They would have, they had their Roman gods but they would also, you know, ISIS eventually becomes a Roman, becomes acceptable in Rome. You have Sol Invictus, which is gonna wait making its way and eventually Apollo. They would bring in all the gods of the other places they worship, polytheism was a thing. And to them, the state and religion were the same thing. So it's confusing to them to have the state and religion separate. Okay, so that's the background you need to understand. So when Constantine, before the Battle of Millvian Bridge in 312, there's another emperor claimant that he's trying to basically decide who gets to be the guy in charge here. This is not long after Diocletian's, what's the empire up in the 280s. He, as you mentioned, he has this vision of a cross and he puts the kai in the row on their shields and they win this battle. So to him, I don't think it would have been that different to Sol Invictus because if you get some time to read, Sol Invictus and the early portrayals of Christ are very, very similar. So to him, you have to think the Roman emperor is gonna say, well, if I can unite people into this one thing and it's gonna make more successful, great. 'Cause once again, there's two different viewpoints on this, but Constantine isn't baptized until his deathbed. That was, though, very normal during that era in time. Because people believe that baptism washed other sins away, so why not do all the bad stuff and then wait till the end? So if you look at the morality, though, in Constantine's life, he kills one of his sons, he kills his wife, he doesn't do a lot of things that make him look like a moral and upright person. So I tend to not believe that this idea of Christianity becoming a big part of Constantine's life. I think it was a convenient part of his life because as well, in the early 300s, Christians only made up about 2% of the Roman Empire. So for him to elevate this one group out of other ones, it doesn't make a lot of political sense. But then what it does make sense as, well, you can form this new religion based on what you want, then, if you're going to elevate into political power. So people start converting to Christianity likely not because of their belief system, but because you got political advancement if you became a Christian, because that's how Constantine was operating. So that's not to bad mouth Christianity, that's not to say anything like that. But I do think that at that point in time, it was more of a political decision for him than anything else. And it's not going to become the official Roman state religion until, I believe it's 380 under the edict of Nicaea by Theodosius the Great. So it is quite a while before it becomes the official Roman state religion. And Constantine also is still putting up a lot of pagan monuments during this time as well. So you have to look at that too. So I think it was more of a convenient thing. But at the same time, if you want to look at it for divine inspiration as well, if that doesn't happen, would Christianity have gotten as wide as it has globally? So I think there can also be good things that come out of bad, you know? - And there normally are, you know, it seems to me like it was a huge boon for Catholicism. And there was a, one of his confidants was Bishop Asubius and they communicated frequently. And it seemed like that there, it was a big boon for Catholicism to be able to bring that in as part of the Roman Empire. And yet it's questionable as you've covered very well. So are you familiar at all? You were raised Christian, I believe, yes? - Yeah. - Yeah. - Are you familiar with, well, let me back up. Yeah, Bishop and I talk frequently on as guests on podcasts as well as on our own podcasts that we believe we're in a spiritual war. - Yeah. - And that there are principles and powers that are not flesh and blood that are at work here. And I know this may be out of your wheelhouse, maybe not, but nonetheless, I'm wondering as being raised Catholic Christian, if you've had any exposure to the book of Revelations and if so, have you read it? And because it certainly seems to talk about that in the book of Revelations, not certainly, it definitely talks about it. And there are these forces of good and evil that are more than Democrat Republican, that are more than liberal versus conservative, that are more than communism versus capitalism, that seem to be at play here. And if there's corollaries to the Roman Empire, so be it, if not, I'd just love to hear your opinion on those things. - Well, I think the thing you have to consider is there's always this overarching idea of evil, right? Because if there is no evil, there can be no good because there has to be something in order to be in opposite there has to be in its existence. Aquinas talks a lot about that. But if you wanna look at Revelation as a thing, there's two different viewpoints in this once again. There's the idea of it really being this final battle and there's the other idea of it was, was it describing the persecutions of Christians in the late empire? So there are a couple different ways you can look at it. But I think more importantly, I do think this is a spiritual battle. I think there has always been evil throughout time and you can look at evil even going back into pagan Rome. And in the 270s, Aurelian takes this empire that had lost its east, it lost parts of its west. It was just essential. All these people were fighting for years on who was going to be in control. And he puts it all back together and fixes the economy and issues new money. So what happens? His secretary kills him. So I think the thing you have to consider is there is always evil throughout history. And I think the thing that I realize about where we are in history right now, and I think that's the biggest reason that I've had a big mouth the last four or five years, is we're at a point where good people can't keep their mouth shut anymore. Because if you do, you're allowing evil to continue and you're allowing evil to win. And it's always going to be there and there's always going to be temptation and there's always going to be this force we're working against. But we always have to be vigilant and we always have to be pushing forward. And I think to just say, okay, now Trump is in office and we've won, well, I really don't think that's the best way to look at things. I think there's always a battle to be won. There's always an evil force out there and we always have to be vigilant. - Yeah, and it sounds like from what you've been telling us, every story is like, they came in, they took over, they fix it, and then they got killed. So it's kind of like, hey man, he fixes it, I hope to God he does. - Yeah. - Well, one of the major things that Gibbon, I was talking to one of my friends literally an hour before I got on with you guys today. One of the major things that Gibbon does not mention it to climb and fall the Roman Emperor, but I think it's actually the major piece of it, is if you look at it, the major thing they lose is ethics. And what I mean from the viewpoint of people keeping each other accountable, people doing what's right, people continuing to refer to the good. And I think because of that, that's why you see this. Not that Rome was this, I don't think people necessarily have to have the same religious beliefs in order to be ethical. I think ethics is really a personal thing, but I think if you look at when Rome starts to decline and fall, it's because it loses its ethics as a society. And I think the thing we have to look about about where we are in America right now, we have to put ethics back in. So that means people saying, well, Jenner's gonna run for governor of California, I don't really agree with that because I think that's a weird person. Like we have to really continue to further what we think is right and keep the ethics of the group in, otherwise that is how this thing collapses. And I think if you look at it throughout history, that's the major thing that goes out. When ethics is out, nothing else works. - Yeah, I think that's brilliant. - That's spot on. And that's what's happened, you know, it's been accelerated. It's not just happened in the last four years. It's been very covert, crawling up on us. You mentioned 9/11, you know, it's unconstitutional for us to get our bags ransacked at the airport, but it's unconstitutional. And they don't even care enough to put them back in nice order, they just ransacked them. - I don't know about you guys, I always opt out of security too. And I don't know if I'm supposed to like, you know, feel offended or tip them after I get my pat down. - Yeah, well, I'll tell you, last time I got a pat down, the guy patted my crotch. And I was like, are you serious right now? You know, I mean, it's really unconstitutional. And we little by little, it's been insidious. It's been sneaking up on us for our safety, for our safety, quote. And so the only reason that it seems so intensified right now is because I believe that Trump foiled their plans in 2016. He wasn't supposed to win. They really thought Hillary Clinton was gonna win. And she was going to take us to war and she was gonna end you the plan. And Trump, you know, pulled a hat-trick and set them back for four years. And so now they've had to scramble to try to catch up. But I have this belief that God always wins in the end. And I think that that's what we have to do. And we have to have big mouths, I'll quote you. You know, I think that's what you said. We have to encourage, we have to have the courage to speak the truth. And the truth is not valued in today's world, not really. You know, it's been persecuted. And in many cases, it's been prosecuted. And yet hopefully the tides are turning. And it sure seems that way with the way the elections came out. When you look at the US map, it's almost entirely red, which means that Muslims and Jews and people of color and Hispanics and all types of people, women and men voted differently than they typically would vote because they're saying enough already. Well, I think that goes back to the point of ethics, right? Like, I think the thing we are seeing is, you know, a lot of the gender stuff's just getting dropped. You know, AOC dropped her pronouns from her bio on Twitter. So you're starting to see, and that gets to the point of ethics going back in, right? You're starting to see these certain things. But now what do we have to do? We have to stop penalizing producers, right? This tax system is insane. We have to start getting things in that reward people that are producing and that are doing things that are good for mankind. And because right now a lot of them are perverted in the way our systems are set up, so we have to be more ethical as a group, which I think we're actually starting to see, but I think as well, we have to start rewarding producers because it goes back to, if you guys are red atlas shrugged at all, you know, a society when it goes to just people taking is going to fall apart and the producers after a while are gonna say, well, I'm not gonna produce for you anymore because you have to reward people for their production. If you're not, it's a bastardization of what should be. Right, and it's very constitutional. You know, we're all gifted by God with an inalienable rights for life, liberty, and the pursuit, key word, pursuits. It's not guaranteed. Not guaranteed. You have to, you have these rights. We all have these rights and you have to earn them. You have to pursue them and go after them. And that's what, you know, that's the big difference between equity and equality. Yes. Equality is we've all been equally gifted by God with these abilities and equity is we're gifted by an outside source based upon some external measure. And that's, I believe where the ethics start to slip and the morality starts to slip. So anything else important that we haven't talked about yet, I want to be respectful of your time. I know you have another podcast to jump on. No, I think we've hit a lot of great stuff guys. I've haven't gotten to talk about the ethics point, but I think that is really valuable. 'Cause I think if we, because you have to look at, here's the thing about ethics, right? We're all responsible for keeping the people in our group ethical. And if we don't, we're furthering the problem. So I think that's what you have to look at because that's how things start slipping. That's how things start falling apart. Now it doesn't mean you always to be a goody two shoes and be like, like my, I told my six year old, it's not being a tattletale. It doesn't mean that, but it means taking responsibility for things in your small sphere. And if you do see something wrong, making that person take responsibility for it, or kind of not letting them be part of your group, I think that's what it comes down to. Yeah, I think that's really nice to put. The key word, take responsibility. Take responsibility. Yeah, very nice to go. To not stand for the truth is to take a stand for lies. To not contribute to good is to contribute to the bad. You've got to take a side. And so we've really enjoyed talking with you today, Jeremy. And we're happy that we know you do a lot of interviews. We're happy that we were able to get into an ethics topic that you don't get into that. Yes. It's the vital one though, because you can fix currency, you can do sort of things, but if you can't make your society ethical, then that's how things actually fall apart, right? Because that's why all the gender stuff starts happening. That's why people start cheating each other out of money or all these different things. If our group is not being ethical, that's when society collapses. Well, Durkheim said, when laws, when mores are sufficient, laws are unnecessary. Bingo. When mores are insufficient, laws are unenforceable. Correct. And that's about as good as it gets. So maybe we'll just end it there. Thank you so much for your time and your contribution. Keep doing great work and we appreciate you. Hey, thanks for having me, guys. Oh, where can people find you? Oh, yeah, they can find out about our company over at commandyourbrand.com. We help people to appear on the right podcast and get their messages out. And if you're looking for some help with that and you just want some free information where you can get that, I put together a great resource for them called Command Your Empire. So you don't decline and fall like the Roman Empire. So that's over at commandyourempire.com. Yes, we highly recommend it. We highly recommend it. It's weird working with them. We're working with Command Your Brand and they do a great job for us. Yes, they do. So highly recommend that to all of you. And we'll put all that down below. Sure. Okay, God bless, we'll let you go. Take, have a great day. Thanks for having me. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music)
