Civilizations of long ago more civilized than Republicans

[AZ Progressive]

We all know that it seems that Republicans hate welfare, and would be even meaner to the poor if they didn't have resistance.

Yet if you look at history, in civilizations Americans would probably consider more barbaric than modern day America, they had a sense that welfare was needed:

From Wikipedia:

"In the Roman Empire, the first emperor Augustus provided the 'congiaria' or grain dole for citizens who could not afford to buy food. Social welfare was enlarged by the Emperor Trajan.[1] Trajan's program brought acclaim from many, including Pliny the Younger.[2] "
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welfare#History

And from Encyclopedia Britannica on Trajan:

"When he returned to Rome in 99, he behaved with respect and affability toward the Senate. He was generous to the populace of Rome, to whom he distributed considerable cash gifts, and increased the number of poor citizens who received free grain from the state. " -http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/602150/Trajan/7356/Domestic-policies-as-emperor


As well as the 7th century Islamic world:

"In the Islamic world, Zakat (charity), one of the Five Pillars of Islam, has been collected by the government since the time of the Rashidun caliph Umar in the 7th century. The taxes were used to provide income for the needy, including the poor, elderly, orphans, widows, and the disabled. According to the Islamic jurist Al-Ghazali (Algazel, 1058–1111), the government was also expected to store up food supplies in every region in case a disaster or famine occurred.[7][8] (See Bayt al-mal for further information.)"
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welfare

[jtuck004]

1. Uh..."He was generous to the populace of Rome, to whom he distributed considerable cash gifts..."

Trajan...perhaps not the best example.

"The state" got it's money from conquest and killing of others, the labor of slaves. He used their output to provide that relief to his immediate family and the people they employed to keep him in power.

"Trajan resettled Dacia with Romans and annexed it as a province of the Roman Empire. Aside from their enormous booty (over half a million slaves, according to John Lydus)[66] Trajan's Dacian campaigns benefited the Empire's finances through the acquisition of Dacia's gold mines, managed by an imperial procurator of equestrian rank (procurator aurariarum).
...
One notable act of Trajan during this period was the hosting of a three-month gladiatorial festival in the great Colosseum in Rome (the precise date of this festival is unknown). Combining chariot racing, beast fights and close-quarters gladiatorial bloodshed, this gory spectacle reputedly left 11,000 dead (mostly slaves and criminals, not to mention the thousands of ferocious beasts killed alongside them) and attracted a total of five million spectators over the course of the festival.

"

The government never had anything they didn't take from the labor of the people. What they were giving back was often stolen, belonged to the people in the first place.

Another bit which seems to escape some - slavery, when it wasn't just a death sentence, was more like temporary indentured work, in which it was possible to go on with your life. In any event you were just the loser of a war. They didn't write laws like we did making their neighbors 2/3 of a human, based on a physical characteristic.

In some respects they, in their own contexts, were very much like we are now. And maybe not quite as bad.