I'm not familiar with Gibbon, but keep in mind I've been out of college for years because of financial difficulty, so I'm hardly overeducated.

Well, I'm basing what I said off the introduction to the Clone Wars novels that was written by Lucas himself. He basically states that the Republic was corrupt because the Jedi had offered it too much peace and protection. My impression was that Palaptine took advantage of this and totally swung it in his favor acerbated circumstances. Things would have to be really looked at hard to see if the Republic would have survived if the Jedi had and the Sith defeated by RotS. It could go either way. And Anakin, for all his faults, had a point about someone taking charge and getting people to listen in AotC. I believe that could have helped the Republic. Unfortunately, the guy who did that was UNREDEEMABLY EVIL. XD

I should dig that intro up and type it into LJ for others' reading perusal, to see if maybe I'm reading it wrong or something.

Ahahaha, you're fine. I should be writing Batman Begins pr0n, right now. *slinks off to make Bruce and Ducard do naughty things*