When an individual is protesting society's refusal to acknowledge his dignity as a human being, his very act of protest confers dignity on him. —Bayard Rustin
You measure democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists. —Abbie Hoffman, 1989
The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don't have any.—Alice Walker
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has. —Margaret Mead
Nations succeed—America included, as our founding fathers understood so well in designing our institutions—when compromises are sought to accommodate as many of the diverse interest in our society as possible. Our is a great experiment, one that is worth defending, whatever the price, form domestic subversion as much as from foreign enemies. The best defense that each of us has domestically is to be part of the political dialogue in our communities, across our states, and throughout the nation. —Joseph C. Wilson, The Politics of Truth p. 448
Politics:
Politics is the gentle art of getting votes from the poor and campaign funds from the rich by promising to protect each from the other. —Oscar Ameringer
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies. —Groucho Marx
Information is the currency of democracy. —Thomas Jefferson
Fascism:
If fascism comes, it will not be identified with any shirt movement, nor with an insignia, but it will probably be wrapped up in the American flag and heralded as a plea for liberty and preservation of the constitution. —James Waterman Wise, Jr. (1936)
Liberty and propaganda:
None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free. —Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1809
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength. —George Orwell from, 1984
No matter how paranoid or conspiracy-minded you are, what the government is actually doing is worse than you imagine. —William Blum
a friend of mine
Economic inequality:
Everybody does better when everybody does better. (Jim Hightower's father.) —W. F. "High" Hightower, Jim Hightower's father
400 U.S. Individuals worth more than half of all American households combined! That can't be true?!? —Michael Moore
An imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics. —Plutarch of Chaeronea
Government and propaganda:
[There isn't] a sharp distinction between those who want a centralized economy run by the state, and those who advocate absolute laissez-faire capitalism, meaning businesses can grow and merge until they BECOME the state...—Daniel Cristofani
My own concern is primarily the terror and violence carried out by my own state, for two reasons. For one thing, because it happens to be the larger component of international violence. But also for a much more important reason than that; namely, I can do something about it. So even if the U.S. was responsible for 2 percent of the violence in the world instead of the majority of it, it would be that 2 percent I would be primarily responsible for. And that is a simple ethical judgment. That is, the ethical value of one’s actions depends on their anticipated and predictable consequences. It is very easy to denounce the atrocities of someone else. That has about as much ethical value as denouncing atrocities that took place in the 18th century. —Noam Chomsky
Propaganda in favor of action that is consonant with enlightened self-interest appeals to reason by means of logical arguments based upon the best available evidence fully and honestly set forth. Propaganda in favor of action dictated by the impulses that are below self-interest offers false, garbled or incomplete evidence, avoids logical argument and seeks to influence its victims by the mere repetition of catchwords, by the furious denunciation of foreign or domestic scapegoats, and by cunningly associating the lower passions with the highest ideals, so that atrocities come to be perpetrated in the name of God and the most cynical kind of Realpolitik is treated as a matter of religious principle and patriotic duty.—Aldous Huxley
America is great because America is good. And if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great. 1922. —Reverend John McDowell (See: note)
I no longer hope for audacity. —Matt Damon, quoting his friend
Tyranny:
Once in power, Mussolini, established the model totalitarian state. Having smashed the organisations of the workers, the way was prepared for a savage attack on the standards of the masses in the interests of Big Business. The main brunt of fascism was borne by the working class, against whom it is aimed above all. With their weapons of struggle broken, with the establishment of scab company unions, the conditions were created to drive down the wages and lower the standards of living of the workers. The Labour unions were crushed. Shop stewards' representation in the factories was abolished. The right to strike ended. All Union contracts were rendered void. The employer reigned supreme in the factories once again. He became at the same tune, the "leader" of his employees. Any attempt to strike, any resistance to the wishes of the employer, was "punished with ferocious, penalties by the State. To challenge the employer was to challenge the full force of the State. In the words of the fascists: strikes are crimes "against the social community". —Ted Grant, The Menace of Fascism:
Secrecy is the keystone to all tyranny. Not force, but secrecy and censorship. When any government or church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, "This you may not read, this you must not know," the end result is tyranny and oppression, no matter how holy the motives. Mighty little force is needed to control a man who has been hoodwinked in this fashion; contrariwise, no amount of force can control a free man, whose mind is free. No, not the rack nor the atomic bomb, not anything. You can't conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him. —Robert A. Heinlein
The State did not originate in any form of social agreement, or with any disinterested view of promoting order and justice. Far otherwise. The State originated in conquest and confiscation, as a device for maintaining the stratification of society permanently into two classes —an owning and exploiting class, relatively small, and a propertyless dependent class. Such measures of order and justice as it established were incidental and ancillary to this purpose; it was not interested in any that did not serve this purpose; and it resisted the establishment of any that were contrary to it. No State known to history originated in any other manner, or for any other purpose than to enable the continuous economic exploitation of one class by another. —Albert Jay Nock, "Anarchist's Progress"
Alexis de Tocqueville:
I know of no country in which there is so little independence of mind and real freedom of discussion as in America.
When the past no longer illuminates the future, the spirit walks in darkness.
All those who seek to destroy the liberties of a democratic nation ought to know that war is the surest and shortest means to accomplish it.
There are many men of principle in both parties in America, but there is no party of principle.
What is most important for democracy is not that great fortunes should not exist, but that great fortunes should not remain in the same hands. In that way there are rich men, but they do not form a class.
There is hardly a political question in the United States which does not sooner or later turn into a judicial one.
Liberty cannot be established without morality, nor morality without faith.
Justice Louis D. Brandeis:
Publicity is justly commended as a remedy for social and industrial diseases. Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman. 1914
We must make our choice. We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both. 1941
Behind every argument is someone's ignorance. 1941
Frederic Bastiat:
When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men living together in society, they create for themselves in the course of time a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it.
It seems to me that this is theoretically right, for whatever the question under discussion—whether religious, philosophical, political, or economic; whether it concerns prosperity, morality, equality, right, justice, progress, responsibility, cooperation, property, labor, trade, capital, wages, taxes, population, finance, or government—at whatever point on the scientific horizon I begin my researches, I invariably reach this one conclusion: The solution to the problems of human relationships is to be found in liberty.
Benito Mussolini:
Fascism should more appropriately be called corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power.
Democracy is beautiful in theory; in practice it is a fallacy. You in America will see that some day.
Isaiah 3:14 - King James Bible (Cambridge Ed.):
The LORD will enter into judgment with the ancients of his people, and the princes thereof: for ye have eaten up the vineyard; the spoil of the poor is in your houses.
Alan Moore and David Lloyd's, " V for Vendetta":
Strength Through Purity, Purity Through Faith (comic book)
Strength Through Unity, Unity Through Faith (movie)
William Lyon Mackenzie King:
Where there is little or no public opinion, there is likely to be bad government, which sooner or later becomes autocratic government.
Far more has been accomplished for the welfare and progress of mankind by preventing bad actions than by doing good ones.
"The first thing a politician does after taking office is start the re-election campaign." {I believe, paraphrased}
