There goes the nieghborhood...

Stray

and brutally if history is anything to go by...


The system that the Tang government used to tax farmers was based on the amount of people, not the amount of land in a given family. This worked well at first, since it was easy to compute, but turned sour quickly. When a father would split up land among his sons, there would be more people in the same amount of land. This also meant that the same amount of land got taxed increasingly more as time went on. In addition, the later emperors taxed even more, and even in places where natural disators had occured. Pretty soon the peasants were fed up with it.
The Chinese farmers formed a rebellion in 875 AD, just 12 years after the end of the Rebellion of An and Shi. They roamed the country, gathering support, until they too marched to Chang'an. The peasants captured Chang'an, but without defeating the Tang army, which remained almost fully intact. The Tang generals regrouped, and took back Chang'an. The last remnants of the uprising were defeated in 894 AD.
During the fighting, a man named Zhu Wen surrendured to the Tang army at a key point in the war. In return for this, the emperor renamed him Quanzhong, meaning "absolute loyalty". He was ordered to destroy the last remnants of the uprising with a man named Li Keyong. When they succeeded, Li Keyong also gained the admiration of the emperor. Each man became jealous of the other, and a bitter fued began. Zhu Wen eventually won and set his sights on being emperor.
The new emperor, Zhaozong, had just been captured by a tribe from the Steppes. Zhu Wen gathered an army and resuced him, and forced him to move the capital of China to Luoyang. Soon after, Zhu Wen killed Zhaozong, and three years after, dethroned his only son, Aizong. Zhu Wen made himself emperor, and established the Liang Dynasty in 907 AD. The Tang Dynasty was officially over.

G_Man

Interesting stuff at the least.

However, my philosophy is that if you provide a form of government that the majority approve of, they will rat out anyone plotting against said government before it becomes an issue.

Stray

yet in a materialistic world, where prices never go down, and everything can be bought on credit with people having to make re-payments, there will always be those who are unhappy with their lot, and feel they are being cheated or treated unfairly by those in power.

hence the rivalry between opposing parties in 'democratic' governments...

when each party is only out to put the other down, until they get into rule and continue to screw the little people over anyhow.

Big Boss

so should i call you mr. styles still or the darkness?

Shotgun Styles

wIggy

I see you're in the DMZ. which base? I have a really good friend in Kunsan.

Shotgun Styles

Camp Casey. 11 miles from the DMZ. Casey is the nearest major installation to the border.

Man you should have seen all the E-mails I got from home when Kim set his nuke off. Everyone thought I was gonna get radiation sickness. I was like "shit, we didn't even know what happened until we saw it on the news"!

wIggy

I figured this would be the most appropriate place to ask that question. My buddy had just gotten over there when Kim pulled that little stunt, and a few days later i had sent him an email telling him to "be safe with all that bullshit N. Korea's pulling" and he sent me an email back asking what I was talking about. Kind of funny I think. Is Camp Casey the one where the captain was killed while trimming the tree? I read about it in a book about West Point Class of '66, called The Long Gray Line, GREAT BOOK if you don't already know.

Shotgun Styles

"Operation Paul Bunion".

Man, the Army has a sick sense of humor sometimes. But no, that happened near UNC Checkpoint 3. Near the Bridge of No Return.

Stray

i know a good foot doctor that could fix that...




and welcome back matey

Drunk Monk

damn I was used to the neighborhood being around