The Intelligent Troglodyte’s Guide to Plato’s Republic, 2016a

man’s life, his impious tongue and lips taste kindred blood. Then he banishes and
kills and drops hints about the cancellation of debts and the redistribution of land.”
In this atmosphere of civil strife, the people, fearing for the safety of their
champion and protector, grant him a bodyguard, which he proceeds to strengthen
until there is no one left to oppose him in the city. At this point, a different sort of
person might resign the position of dictator and return, like Cincinnatus, to the
plow. But this champion of the people is no longer a man with any semblance of
temperance in his soul. Having tasted “kindred blood,” he has become a wolf
among men, a tyrant. One of the first things the newly established tyrant does is
start up a war, for people feel they need a strong leader most when they are at war.
While the war is going on, he works to consolidate his power. As the bravest of
those who helped him come to power begin to criticize his regime, he has them
seized and killed. He continues to target such people “until he is left with no friend
or enemy who is worth anything at all.” Socrates contrasts this sort of purge with
that performed by physicians: “they draw off the worst and leave the best, but he
does just the opposite.” The tyrant finds that the more the people in the city grow
to hate him, the more he needs a strong, loyal cadre of bodyguards. So he hires a
private army, recruiting people from other cities (“foreign drones”) as well as from
the ranks of emancipated slaves, the city, of course, picking up the tab. He then
gives himself over to ruthless maintenance of power and to the sort of revelry that
comes of being above the law.
Can you imagine a tyrant coming to power in the United States? How could
this be achieved? What social conditions would make such a thing more
likely?
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