Losing respect for Rand Paul

[vulcanlogician]

He probably wouldn't like it all that much (though some bits likre fucking over poor people would go well with him), I always got the impression that something akin to feudalism was his preferred government, from reading the Republic.

I've read scholarly commentary that agrees with your feudalism assessment. But I interpret Plato in a different way. He was an elitist, no doubt about that. But I don't think he endorsed feudalism at all. 

I say this for three reasons 1) his class of rulers (guardians) were forbidden from owning any kind of wealth or personal property; feudal lords were landowners. 2) He believed that no class of people in a city should be happy at the expense of another class. 3) If any class in Plato's ideal city resembles serfdom, it's the producer class. Producers are not allowed to have any political (decision-making) power in the city, yes, but at the same time, they are the only class allowed to have wealth and personal property. Under feudalism, the wealthy landowner is given absolute political power. In Plato's republic, the rulers are denied the right to hold wealth so that they will act on behalf of the entire city (instead of for their own personal interests).

In Plato's ideal society, Donald Trump is a pleb. In fact, it was Plato's greatest fear was that a wealthy soothsayer would seduce the uneducated masses, and wind up in charge of them. Andrew Sullivan wrote an article about it, which I find highly informative.

I know I'm a Plato nerd, and you probably weren't in the mood for a lecture about my personal take on the Republic. But I want to add one final point.  Plato believed that everyone should be provided with a free education by the government. (A radical idea in his time.) Based on their natural talents, students would become rulers, warriors, or producers. The rulers are selected because they have demonstrated adeptness concerning intellectual pursuits. They are an intellectual elite, not a wealthy elite. They are the so-called "philosopher kings"-- but as I already said, they are "kings" who are forbidden from owning wealth. (Also the term "philosopher" is something of a misnomer. By philosopher, Plato meant anyone who is dedicated to knowledge: scientists, mathematicians, and, of course, what we would call philosophers today all fall under the umbrella of "philosopher".) Feudal lords were often illiterate and uneducated, so the comparison fails in that regard.

Plato was not shy about his disdain for the "ignorant masses." But he didn't despise them because they were poor. He simply saw that many if not most people were uneducated and perfectly content to stay that way. In fact, in his estimation, most people hated learning and knowledge. Plato thought that people of this type should not be given political power because they would use this power unwisely. So while he was most certainly an elitist, I would hardly call him a capitalist, and there are many ways in which comparison with feudal lords doesn't quite gel.