Obama & Cicero: Eloquence, Wisdom & Power (1 of 3)

April 17, 2009 - Robert Garland (Colgate University), Walter Nicgorski (University of Notre Dame), Charles Pazdernik (Grand Valley State University), and Kelli Rudolph (Grand Valley State University) participated in the first panel of the Hauenstein Center's conference, "Barack Obama and the Lessons of Antiquity." Dr. Nicgorski presented a paper on Cicero, eloquence, wisdom, and power.

Dr. Nicgorski, professor in liberal studies at the University of Notre Dame, received his B.A. from Georgetown University, and his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. He is a classically trained political theorist whose primary interests are the political thought of Cicero, that of the American founding, the theory and practice of moral and liberal education and contemporary democratic theory impacted by Christianity. His articles on Cicero, liberal and character education, the American founding, Leo Strauss, and Allan Bloom and other topics have appeared in journals such as Political Theory, Interpretation, and the Political Science Reviewer. He co-edited An Almost Chosen People: The Moral aspirations of Americans (1976) and Leo Strauss: Political Philosopher and Jewish Thinker (1994). Nicgorski is the former editor of The Review of Politics. He has directed NEH summer seminars on the texts of Cicero. He has held a Lilly Endowment faculty fellowship, as well as research fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Bradley Foundation, and the Earhart Foundation.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• cicero
• president
• barack
• obama
• presidency
• crisis
• oratory
• great
• communicator
• rome
• roman
• empire
• american
• rhetoric
• history

[hellgod666]

Ironic this video is, Obama is the type of man Cicero warned us all about.

[danny88101]

Cicero, the great politician of the Ancient Age.

[USAPropaganda]

Dont even try to make a relevance with Obama and Rome, the name Obama doesnt belong in a sentence that includes Rome or any famous Roman

[AlSidre]

@AlSidre In fact I would liken Glenn Beck to Catiline: A man with far too much ambition and no honor, who uses the general populous to gain power through a mixture of conspiracy theories and bribery (Fox brothers) to gain political power.

How long, Mr Beck, will you abuse our patience? And for how long will that madness of yours mock us? To what end will your unbridled audacity hurl itself?

[AlSidre]

@AlSidre If the government was limited the way wanted who would build roads, they are funded by government who would fund public school and therefore make sure that everyone can have an education. How would we take care of the sick and elderly?

Obama is our elected leader and while it is certainly appropriate to criticize him and his style of government, it is certainly not appropriate to make up conspiracy theories and take up arms against elected officials.

[AlSidre]

@hellgod666 No I think he wanted to warn us of people like Glenn Beck. Like Caesar he uses his speeches to rouse the people against the government and unlike Caesar he does not even pretend he is helping the populous.

He is openly against public health care and against government support for small businesses, instead he openly supports the big corporations, whose entire concept is focused on financial gain.

[lubime10]

Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices, but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence and fulfills the duty to express the results of his thought in clear form.

Albert Einstein, quoted in New York Times, March 19, 1940

US (German-born) physicist (1879 - 1955)

[mdonnett1]

I don't understand how Obama's name can be brought into the same conversation that mentions the name "Cicero." Cicero was a great man, a thinker, an orator and a philosopher. What is Obama? He is an organizer of malcontents.