"If tyranny and oppression come
to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy" ~ James Madison
*
"So long as the people do not care to
exercise their freedom,
those who wish to tyrannize will do so;
for tyrants are active and ardent, and will devote themselves
in the name of any number of gods, religious and otherwise,
to put shackles upon sleeping men" --Voltaire.
July 28, 2004
"The test of our progress is not whether
we add more to the abundance of those who have much, it is whether we provide
enough for those who have too little" : Franklin Delano Roosevelt
*
Cowardice asks the question - is it
safe? Expediency asks the question - is it politic? Vanity asks the question -
is it popular? But conscience asks the question - is it right? And there comes a
time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor
popular; but one must take it because it is right: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
*
"Actions are held to be good or bad, not
on their own merits, but according to who does them. There is almost no kind of
outrage-----torture, imprisonment without trial, assassination, the bombing of
civilians-----which does not change its moral color when it is committed by
'our' side. .
The
nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side,
he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them." : George Orwell
*
"Unthinking respect for authority is the
greatest enemy of truth."
Albert Einstein
*
"I swore never to be silent whenever
human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides.
Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the
tormentor, never the tormented." - Elie Weisel
*
We are reluctant to admit that we owe
our liberties to men of a type that today we hate and fear -- unruly men,
disturbers of the peace, men who resent and denounce what Whitman called 'the
insolence of elected persons' -- in a word, free men.: Gerald W. Johnson
July 26, 2004
A people that values its privileges
above its principles soon loses both." Dwight Eisenhower
*
"It is never right to do wrong or to
requite wrong with wrong, or when we suffer evil to defend ourselves by doing
evil in return." : Socrates 469 - 399 BC
*
In the country of the blind the one-eyed
man is king: Erasmus c.1469 - 1536
July 24, 2004
There is nothing so powerful as truth,
and often nothing so strange." : Daniel Webster
*
"The trust of the innocent is the liar's
most useful tool." : Stephen King
*
Education is a better
safeguard of liberty than a standing army: Edward Everett
July 23, 2004
Kings had always been involving and
impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that
the good of the people was the object: Abraham Lincoln
July 22, 2004
It is a truism that almost any sect,
cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political
power to do so, and will follow it by suppressing opposition, subverting all
education to seize early the minds of the young, and by killing, locking up, or
driving underground all heretics: Robert A. Heinlein
*
All sects are different, because they
come from men; morality is everywhere the same, because it comes from God.:
Voltaire
July 21, 2004
When the people fear their government,
there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty:
Thomas Jefferson
July 19, 2004
A standing army is one of the greatest
mischief that can possibly happen: James Madison: US fourth president, 1751-1836
*
"Over grown military establishments are
under any form of government inauspicious to liberty, and are to be regarded as
particularly hostile to republican liberty." George Washington
*
"The love of liberty is the love of
others; the love of power is the love of ourselves." William Hazlitt
*
I hate it when they say, 'He gave his
life for his country.' Nobody gives their life for anything. We steal the lives
of these kids. We take it away from them. They don't die for the honor and glory
of their country. We kill them." - Admiral Gene LaRocque.
July 18, 2004
The evils of government are directly
proportional to the tolerance of the people: Frank Kent
*
When the same man, or set of men, holds
the sword and the purse, there is an end of liberty: George Mason
*
The price of apathy towards public
affairs is to be ruled by evil men: Plato
*
Demagogue: one who preaches doctrines he
knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots: H.L. Mencken
July 17, 2004
All men having power ought to be
mistrusted: James Madison
*
The state has, in order to control us,
introduced division into our thinking, so that we come to distrust others and
look to the state for protection! But the roots of our individualism remind us
that what we are is inseparable from the source from which all others derive;
that coercive practices that threaten our neighbor also threaten us.: Butler Shaffer
July 16, 2004
In the end, we will remember not the
words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends: Martin Luther King Jr., "The Trumpet of Conscience", 1967
*
"We can easily forgive a child who is
afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the
light." Plato
July 15, 2004
Don't ever let them pull you down so low
as to hate them. (also cited as: I will permit no man to narrow and degrade my
soul by making me hate him.) Booker T. Washington
*
The soul of our country needs to be
awakened . . .When leaders act contrary to conscience, we must act contrary to
leaders: Veterans Fast for Life
July 14, 2004
Words - so innocent and powerless as
they are, as standing in a dictionary, how potent for good and evil they become
in the hands of one who knows how to combine them: Nathaniel Hawthorne
*
Behind the ostensible government sits
enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no
responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul
the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first
task of the statesmanship of the day": Theodore Roosevelt, April 19, 1906
July 13, 2004
"Unthinking respect for authority is the
greatest enemy of truth." (Albert Einstein)
*
"Freedom of press is limited to those
who own one." (Henry Louis Mencken)
July 12, 2004
To announce that there must be no
criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president, right or
wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the
American public. Theodore Roosevelt: (1918)
*
Naturally the common people don't want
war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is
understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine
policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is
a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist
dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding
of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being
attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the
country to danger. It works the same in any country. Hermann Göring: quote verified athttp://www.snopes.com/quotes/goering.htm
*
A person will worship something, have no
doubt about that. We may think our tribute is paid in secret in the dark
recesses of our hearts, but it will out. That which dominates our imaginations
and our thoughts will determine our lives, and our character. Therefore, it
behooves us to be careful what we worship, for what we are worshipping we are
becoming. Ralph Waldo Emerson
July 10, 2004
The men the American people admire most
extravagantly are the most daring liars; the men they detest most violently are
those who try to tell them the truth: Henry Louis Mencken: American humorous journalist, 1880-1956
*
A single lie destroys a whole reputation
for integrity: Baltasar Gracian: Spanish philosopher and writer, 1601-1658
*
Make the lie big, make it simple, keep
saying it, and eventually they will believe it: Adolf Hitler
July 9, 2004
"The people who, in order to enjoy the
liberty which suites them, resort to the representative system, must exercise an
active and constant surveillance over their representatives, and reserve for
themselves...the right to discard them if they betray their trust, and to revoke
the powers which them might have abused.": Benjamin Constant.
*
"Must we, under the happy hope of a false tranquility, sacrifice to the people
in power the public welfare, and under vain pretence of preserving the peace,
abandon the empire to robbers who would plunder it" : Helvetius
July 8, 2004
"We are the ruling race of the world. .
. . We will not renounce our part in the mission of our race, trustee, under
God, of the civilization of the world. . . . He has marked us as his chosen
people. . . . He has made us adept in government that we may administer
government among savage and senile peoples." : Sen. Alfred Beveridge
*
"I firmly believe that when any territory outside the present territorial limits
of the United States becomes necessary for our defense or essential for our
commercial development, we ought to lose no time in acquiring it." : Sen. Orville Platt of Connecticut 1894.
*
"Between 1898 and 1934, the Marines invaded Cuba 4 times, Nicaragua 5 times,
Honduras 7 times, the Dominican Republic 4 times, Haiti twice, Guatemala once,
Panama twice, Mexico 3 times and Columbia 4 times," Washington has intervened
militarily in foreign countries more than 200 times."
*
"If the people are not convinced (that the Free World is in mortal danger) it
would be impossible for Congress to vote the vast sums now being spent to avert
danger. With the support of public opinion, as marshalled by the press, we are
off to a good start. It is our Job - yours and mine -- to keep our people
convinced that the only way to keep disaster away from our shores is to build up
America's might." -- Charles Wilson, Chairman of the Board of General Electric and Truman
appointee to head the Office of Defence Mobilization, in a speech to the
Newspaper Publishers Association, 1950
It is a tragic mix-up when the United
States spends $500,000 for every enemy soldier killed, and only $53 annually on
the victims of poverty: Martin Luther King, Jr: 1929-1968
*
"Cowardice asks the question: is it
safe? Expediency asks the question: is it politic? Vanity asks the question: is
it popular? But conscience asks the question: is it right? And there comes a
time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor
popular- but one must take it simply because it is right." : Martin Luther King
Jr. 1929-1968
*
"Youth is the first victim of war; the
first fruit of peace. It takes 20 years or more of peace to make a man; it takes
only 20 seconds of war to destroy him." : King Baudouin I: King of Belgium
July 2, 2004
If Tyranny and Oppression come to this
land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy: James Madison: US fourth president, 1751-1836
*
The means of defense against foreign
danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home: James
Madison: US fourth president, 1751-1836
*
The welfare of the people in particular
has always been the alibi of tyrants, and it provides the further advantage of
giving the servants of tyranny a good conscience: Albert Camus: French novelist, essayist, and playwright.1957 Nobel Prize for
Literature. 1913-1960
*
A great wave of oppressive tyranny isn't
going to strike, but rather a slow seepage of oppressive laws and regulations
from within will sink the American dream of liberty: George Baumler
*
This and no other is the root from which
a tyrant springs; when he first appears he is a protector: Plato: Ancient Greek
philosopher (428/427-348/347 B.C.)
July 1, 2004
I was provided with additional input
that was radically different from the truth. I assisted in furthering that
version: Oliver North
*
Fear is not in the habit of speaking
truth: Publius Cornelius Tacitus
*
The great enemy of clear language is
insincerity. When there is a gap between one's real and one's declared aims, one
turns, as it were, instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a
cuttlefish squirting out ink: George Orwell : English novelist, essayist, and critic, 1903-1950
Updated/Revised:
Saturday, October 02, 2004 10:05:39 -0700
