Quotes about commitment
page 15

“If the Europeans are telling the truth in their claim that they have killed six million Jews in the Holocaust during the World War II - which seems they are right in their claim because they insist on it and arrest and imprison those who oppose it, why should the Palestinian nation pay for the crime. Why have they come to the very heart of the Islamic world and are committing crimes against the dear Palestine using their bombs, rockets, missiles and sanctions. […] The same European countries have imposed the illegally-established Zionist regime on the oppressed nation of Palestine. If you have committed the crimes so give a piece of your land somewhere in Europe or America and Canada or Alaska to them to set up their own state there. Then the Iranian nation will have no objections, will stage no rallies on the Qods Day and will support your decision.”

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (1956) 6th President of the Islamic Republic of Iran

Translation by Islamic Republic News Agency, Dec 2005
2005, The World without Zionism, 2005

War, Truth, World, Support

“I picked up a newspaper today and I couldn't believe it. I read eight headlines that talked about chaos, violence, unrest. And it just was Henny Penny -- "The sky is falling." I've never seen anything like it! And here is a country that's being liberated, here are people who are going from being repressed and held under the thumb of a vicious dictator, and they're free. And all this newspaper could do, with eight or 10 headlines, they showed a man bleeding, a civilian, who they claimed we had shot —one thing after another.
From the very beginning, we were convinced that we would succeed, and that means that that regime would end. And we were convinced that as we went from the end of that regime to something other than that regime, there would be a period of transition. And, you cannot do everything instantaneously; it's never been done, everything instantaneously. We did, however, recognize that there was at least a chance of catastrophic success, if you will, to reverse the phrase, that you could in a given place or places have a victory that occurred well before reasonable people might have expected it, and that we needed to be ready for that; we needed to be ready with medicine, with food, with water. And, we have been.
Freedom's untidy, and free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things. They're also free to live their lives and do wonderful things. And that's what's going to happen here.”

Donald Rumsfeld (1932) U.S. Secretary of Defense

DOD news briefing following the fall of Baghdad (11 April 2003) http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/2003/tr20030411-secdef0090.html

People, Food, Freedom, Water

“Today's looting and acts of violence in Baltimore will not be tolerated. In response, I have put the Maryland National Guard on alert so they can be in position to deploy rapidly as needed. I strongly condemn the actions of the offenders who are engaged in direct attacks against innocent civilians, businesses and law enforcement officers. There is a significant difference between protesting and violence and those committing these acts will be prosecuted under the fullest extent of the law.My thoughts and prayers go out to the men and women in uniform who are actively working to stem this violence and several who been injured in the line of duty. These malicious attacks against law enforcement and local communities only betray the cause of peaceful citizens seeking answers and justice following the death of Freddie Gray.”

Larry Hogan (1956) American politician

" Statement From Governor Larry Hogan On Violence In Baltimore City http://governor.maryland.gov/2015/04/27/statement-from-governor-larry-hogan-on-violence-in-baltimore-city/" (27 April 2015).

Death, Women, Men, Peace

“"Diversity" as an abstraction has no meaning. Today, however, it means racial preference and nothing else. A commitment to diversity, apart from the ends it may serve, is absurd.”

Harry V. Jaffa (1918–2015) American historian and collegiate professor

2000s, Is Diversity Good? (2003)

“There is more magic in sin if it is not committed.”

V.S. Pritchett (1900–1997) British writer and critic

"Rudyard Kipling: A Pre-Raphaelite's Son", p. 36
The Tale Bearers: English and American Writers (1980)

“I hear Republicans and Libertarians and so forth talking about property rights, but they stop talking about property rights as soon as the subject of American Indians comes up, because they know fully well, perhaps not in a fully articulated, conscious form, but they know fully well that the basis for the very system of endeavor and enterprise and profitability to which they are committed and devoted accrues on the basis of theft of the resources of someone else. They are in possession of stolen property. They know it. They all know it. It's a dishonest endeavor from day one.”

Ward Churchill (1947) Political activist

in Z Magazine, vol. 8 (1995), p. 32

“Consider Every Battle a Life and Death Struggle. This principle focuses on commitment and determination. When your life is at stake, you make an absolute commitment of all your power to your survival. For a shaman, the proper way to approach every task it with absolute commitment. The shaman realizes that a predator is not automatically successful because it is equipped with sharper teeth or stronger muscles. A predator can be seriously injured or even killed during the hunt. The lion kicked in the jaw by a zebra might be unable to hunt and die of starvation. So in every hunt, the hunter must be prepared to die. But this threat gives the hunter the advantage because it ensures that they will operate at peak performance level, completely at attention, keenly observant of everything in their environment, and fully in charge at the moment of action.”

Jose Stevens

The Power Path: The Shaman's Way to Success in Business and Life. Dr. Jose Stevens and Lena Stevens. ISBN 978-1577312178.

Life, Death, Way, Success

“The phrase "contempt of court" often misleads persons not lawyers, and causes them to misapprehend its meaning, and to suppose that a proceeding for contempt of court amounts to some process taken for the purpose of vindicating the personal dignity of the Judges, and protecting them from personal insults as individuals. Very often it happens that contempt is committed by a personal attack on a Judge or an insult offered to him; but as far as their dignity as individuals is concerned, it is of very subordinate importance compared with the vindication of the dignity of the Court itself; and there would be scarcely a case, I think, in which any Judge would consider that, as far as his personal dignity goes, it would be worth while to take any steps.”

Colin Blackburn, Baron Blackburn (1813–1896) British judge

Skipworth's Case (1873), L. R. 9 Q. B. Ca. 232.

Thinking, Personality

“Success in the sociologists' aim might lead, in T. S. Eliot's phrase, to "systems so perfect that no one would need to be good." This view forgets that men long ago committed themselves to the endeavor to control their own collective behavior, not only in the ways sanctioned by the churches but in others, by making it to men's interest to do good. And they have increasingly based the endeavor on an understanding of natural laws of human behavior, those of economics, for example. So that the question is not: Shall this kind of control be undertaken? but: Where shall it stop? A sociologist might also argue that his religious critics have more faith in him than in their own doctrine, the doctrine that man is infinitely tough and resourceful and is not easily cheated of his freedom to sin. What God has given no man can take away, certainly no sociologist. More seriously, he might argue that the social sciences are not in train to eliminate morality but to make greater demands of it. A sociology that shows us unsuspected or not hitherto understood ways in which men are bound up with one another invites more refined answers to the question: "Am I my brother's keeper?"”

George C. Homans (1910–1989) American sociologist

George C. Homans (1956), "Giving a dog a bad name." in: The Listener, Vol. 56. p. 233; Reprinted in: George C. Homans (1962), Sentiments & activities; essays in social science https://archive.org/details/sentimentsactivi00homa, p. 117-8

Men, God, Faith, Law

“For commitment theorists, political and economic ideologies that obey transcendent behavioral laws do for people pretty much what religious belief in the supernatural is supposed to do. One frequently cited example of religious-like ideology is Lenin's doctrine of dialectical materialism. An equally plausible candidate is what financier George Soros calls "market fundamentalism." Like more familiar religious doctrines, these promissory ideologies seem to maintain the faith no matter how many contrary facts or reasons they face. But if such secular ideologies perform the same functions as religious ideologies, then why did at least 50 percent of Marx-fearing Russians feel the need to preserve their belief in the supernatural (survey by Subbotsky 2000)? And why is the overwhelming majority of market believers also God-fearing (Novak 1999; Podhoretz 1999). What is it about belief in the supernatural that thwarts social defection and deception, underpinning moral orders as no secular ideology seems able to do for long?”

Scott Atran (1952) Anthropologist

Introduction: an evolutionary riddle, p. 14
In Gods We Trust: The Evolutionary Landscape of Religion (2002)

God, People, Fear, Faith

“You read in the revelations given to John on the Isle of Patmos, concerning the latter days, that a voice was heard crying to the Saints in Babylon-"Come out of her, O my people, be not partakers of her sins, lest ye receive of her plagues, for her sins have reached unto heaven," etc. Has this voice been heard? Yes, the Latter-day Saints have heard it. Has the angel flown through the midst of heaven and delivered the Gospel to the children of men? Yes, we believe all this. Do we believe that the Lord sent his messengers to Joseph Smith, and commanded him to refrain from joining any Christian church, and to refrain from the wickedness he saw in the churches, and finally delivered to him a message informing him that the Lord was about to establish his kingdom on the earth, and led him on step by step until he gave him the revelation concerning the plates? Yes, this is all correct. Did Joseph receive these revelations? He did. Did the heavenly messengers come to Joseph, and commit to him the keys of the Aaronic Priesthood? Yes, we believe all this. Did they commit to him the keys of the Melchizedek Priesthood? Yes. This is all correct, we believe all this.”

Brigham Young (1801–1877) Latter Day Saint movement leader

Journal of Discourses 18:239 (June 23, 1874)
1870s

Men, Children, People, Angels

“SSA Piro asked Hussein why Iraq was the only country to applaud the 9/11 attack, which Hussein immediately denied.… Hussein stated that he wrote editorials against the attack, but also spoke of the cause which led men to commit these acts. The cause was never reviewed which could create such hatred to kill innocent people.”

Saddam Hussein (1937–2006) Iraqi politician and President

Conversation with FBI Senior Special Agent George L. Piro (28 June 2004); National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 279 http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB279/index.htm. Attributed

Men, People, Country

“To truly feel like we're fighting terrorism, we need as much intelligence and infiltration as possible into known rivals of democracy. Once that information is collected, a sincere commitment must be made to thwart their effects through unified/joint military resolve.”

Tom Clancy (1947–2013) American author

2000s, GameSpy interview

Feeling, Democracy, Intelligence, Fight

“This Conference:… (3) recognises that there are among us persons who experience themselves as having a homosexual orientation. Many of these are members of the Church and are seeking the pastoral care, moral direction of the Church, and God's transforming power for the living of their lives and the ordering of relationships. We commit ourselves to listen to the experience of homosexual persons and we wish to assure them that they are loved by God and that all baptised, believing and faithful persons, regardless of sexual orientation, are full members of the Body of Christ; (4) while rejecting homosexual practice as incompatible with Scripture, calls on all our people to minister pastorally and sensitively to all irrespective of sexual orientation and to condemn irrational fear of homosexuals”

Peter Akinola (1944) Anglican Primate of the Church of Nigeria

Resolution 1.10 on Human Sexuality, Lambeth Conference 1988.
Associated quotations

Love, God, People, Fear

“People have got to be careful coming to Fiji and say Fijian people or taukei be careful of what you are doing you are trespassing, you are committing domestic terrorism. I would like to warn Mr Hughes to be careful. To do his own work properly and not to tread where angels fear to tread.”

Apisai Tora (1934) Fijian politician

Senate speech, 24 August 2004 (excerpts)

People, Fear, Angels

“We are so far identical with our ancestors and our contemporaries that it is very rarely we can see anything that they do not see. It is not unjust that the sins of the fathers should be visited upon the children, for the children committed the sins when in the persons of their fathers.”

Samuel Butler (1835–1902) novelist

Personal Identity
The Note-Books of Samuel Butler (1912), Part IV - Memory and Design

Children, Personality

“"… the secret of a long lasting marriage is…… communication. When we talk about issues and really open up to each other, things are great between us. When we keep things to ourselves, grudges and resentments build up and we end up arguing." …"What good is talking if neither of you are really committed?… marriage comes down to actions. I think people talk too much about the things that bother them, instead of actually doing the little things that keep a marriage strong. You have to know what your spouse needs from you, and then you do it. And you avoid doing the things that harm the relationship. If your spouse acts the same way, your marriage can make it through anything."”

Nicholas Sparks (1965) American writer and novelist

Micah and Nicholas Sparks, Chapter 8, p. 113-114
2000s, Three Weeks with My Brother (2004)

Marriage, People, Secret, Way

“One thing you must know: Just as there is no comparison between actually hearing the sound of harp-strings sweetly plucked and listening to someone talking about it, so too there is no comparison between words which are received in pure grace, issuing from a living heart, spoken by living lips, and those self-same words committed to dry parchment — especially words in German. For these somehow grow chill, losing their vitality like roses cut. For the enchanting melody which, more than anything else, moves human hearts, then fades away, so that the words are received now into the dryness of dry hearts. No harp-strings were ever so sweet but, when stretched across dry timber, they fall silent. An unloving heart can no more understand a love-filled speaker than a German an Italian. Therefore, an eager enquirer should hasten to the out-flowing streams of these sweet teachings so that she may see and observe them at their source in all its living and wondrous beauty – that is, the in-flowing of present grace which is able to restore dead hearts to life.”

Henry Suso (1295–1366) Dominican friar and mystic

The Exemplar, The Little Book of Eternal Wisdom

Love, Life, Beauty, Understanding

“I count my time working for Dortch Oldham as one of the most important formative experiences of my life… There is nothing that tests your commitment to a goal like getting a few doors closed in your face. Mr. Oldham taught legions of young people to communicate quickly, clearly and with passion, a lesson that has served me well in my life since then.”

Rick Perry (1950) 14th and current United States Secretary of Energy

2009-02-27
Dortch Oldham dies at 89
E. Thomas
Wood
Nashville Post
http://nashvillepost.com/news/2009/2/27/dortch_oldham_dies_at_89
2009

Life, People, Communication, Passion

“I worked to live and to make a living for my own; as long as neither myself nor my own suffered too much, I remained that which you call honest. Then work got scarce and with unemployment came hunger. It was then that that great law of nature, that imperious voice that allows no retort: the instinct of survival, pushed me to commit some of the crimes and offences that you accuse me of and that I recognise being the author of.”

Ravachol (1859–1892) French anarchist

J'ai travaillé pour vivre et faire vivre les miens ; tant que ni moi ni les miens n'avons trop souffert, je suis resté ce que vous appelez honnête. Puis le travail a manqué, et avec le chômage est venue la faim. C'est alors que cette grande loi de la nature, cette voix impérieuse qui n'admet pas de réplique : l'instinct de la conservation, me poussa à commettre certains des crimes et délits que vous me reprochez et dont je reconnais être l'auteur.
Trial statement

Hunger, Law, Nature, Suffering

“Tolstoy, the Russian writer, said in War and Peace: “I cannot conceive of a man not being free unless he is dead.” While this statement sounds a bit exaggerated, it gets at a basic truth. What Tolstoy is saying in substance is that the absence of freedom is the presence of death. Any nation or government that deprives an individual of freedom is in that moment committing an act of moral and spiritual murder. Any individual who is not concerned about his freedom commits an act of moral and spiritual suicide.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

[http://mlk-kpp01.stanford.edu/primarydocuments/Vol5/17July1959_AddressattheFiftiethAnnualNAACPConvention.pdf Address at the Fiftieth Annual NAACP Convention (17 July 1959)
1950s

Death, War, Truth, Peace

“For those who care, and I understand if you don't: Today I quit being a Christian. I'm out. I remain committed to Christ as always but not to being "Christian" or to being part of Christianity. It's simply impossible for me to "belong" to this quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous group. For ten years, I've tried. I've failed. I'm an outsider. My conscience will allow nothing else. … In the name of Christ, I refuse to be anti-gay. I refuse to be anti-feminist. I refuse to be anti-artificial birth control. I refuse to be anti-Democrat. I refuse to be anti-secular humanism. I refuse to be anti-science. I refuse to be anti-life. In the name of Christ, I quit Christianity and being Christian. Amen.”

Anne Rice (1941) American writer

2 Facebook posts http://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=129786343731298&id=66435815451 at 13:41 (28 July 2010) http://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=113868381998571&id=66435815451; quoted in "Anne Rice: 'I Quit Being A Christian' " by Jessie Kunhardt in The Huffington Post (29 July 2010) http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07/29/anne-rice-i-quit-being-a_n_663915.html

Life, Hostility, Birth, Understanding

“Nobody ever wrote so well so fast as Jim. One year he wrote, and we published, nine novels. It was an obsession. Back in 1941, his father had been in an asylum in Oklahoma City, begging Jim to get him out. Jim needed money to get him out, so he said to his father, "Give me a month, and I'll raise the money." His father brightened, because Jim never went back on his word. Jim took a bus to New York City and went door to door to the publishing houses, asking for money for a hotel room, a rented typewriter and meals so he could write a novel. Finally, at Modern Age, they took a chance, and in 10 days he wrote a novel. But things being what they are in publishing, it was a month plus one day before Jim got his advance. The same day, a telegram arrived. His father had committed suicide, ripping the excelsior out of his mattress and stuffing it down his throat. When Jim would drink he would sometimes cry and say, "Why couldn't he have waited another day? Didn't he trust me?"”

Arnold Hano (1922) American writer

From "Jim Thompson, 1906 - 1977," in The Los Angeles Times (May 1, 1977), p. X3
Other Topics

Money, Age, Drink, Suicide

“On any longer view, man is only fitfully committed to the rational — to thinking, seeing, learning, knowing. Believing is what he's really proud of.”

Martin Amis (1949) Welsh novelist

"The voice of the lonely crowd" (2002)

Thinking, Learning

“… Lewis will be remembered most for his unfailing commitment to justice as a concept that must rise above politics. For it is the Constitution, not any party, ideology or official, that merits Americans' constant allegiance.”

Anthony Lewis (1927–2013) American journalist

[Star Tribune staff, December 21, 2001, Star Tribune: Newspaper of the Twin Cities, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Lewis and the law - Powerful writing rooted in respect, 32A]
About

Justice

“When Taylor began his efforts at the Midvale Steel Company in the 1880s, several members of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers were likewise interested in labor management. Industrial capitalism was running up against renewed resistance from the growing ranks of labor, still committed to a sense of work integrity and craftsmanship. Task management, or scientific management as it came to be called, began to take shape in the eighties as the way to break the worker's threatening resistance. The heart of this approach is the systematic reduction of work into discrete, routinized tasks, totally separated from any policy decisions about the job. … For capitalism to be firmly in control, it must monopolize information and techniques as surely as it controls the rest of the means of production. The worker must be permitted only to perform certain specific narrow tasks as planned by management.”

John Zerzan (1943) American anarchist and primitivist philosopher and author

Source: Elements of Refusal (1988), p. 165

Way, Decision, Sense, Effort

“Although each of our armed services is unique and different, the U. S. Army holds a special position of significance and trust. Its ranks come from the people, the country's roots, and it is closest to the people. In foreign confrontations the United States is not committed until its land forces- its Army- is committed. And in the event of hostilities, the Army historically has borne the brunt of war, the human cost, taking the great bulk of the casualties. The Army as an institution knows this and has been traditionally reluctant to go to war, its leaders seeking to insure that war is truly necessary and that our civilian leaders exploit all other avenues before taking that final step.”

Bruce Palmer Jr. (1913–2000) United States Army Chief of Staff

Source: The 25-Year War: America's Military Role in Vietnam (1984), p. 209

Hostility, War, People, Country

“The degree to which they are a community is marked by the degree of effort they devote to attain their purpose, the degree of their commitment to it, and the degree of their commitment to each other.”

Béla H. Bánáthy (1919–2003) Hungarian linguist and systems scientist

Source: Designing Social Systems in a Changing World (1996), p. 231; About the essence of the design community

Communication, Effort

“She had said she was afraid of Perry, and she was, but was it simply Perry she feared, or was it a configuration of which he was part […]? The eldest, the brother she loved, had shot himself; Fern had fallen out of a window, or jumped; and Perry was committed to violence, a criminal.”

Truman Capote book In Cold Blood

Part 3
In Cold Blood (1965)

Love, Fear, Parting

“Aaron Russo: Do you think America is going deeper and deeper into becoming a police state?
Ron Paul: Yeah, I think we're moving in that direction, because there's not much we can do without permission. The absence of a police state is that people are free, and if you don't commit crimes you can do what you want. But today, you can't open up a business, you can't develop land, you can't go to the bank, you can't go to the doctor without the government knowing what you're doing. They talk about medical privacy, that's gone. Financial privacy, that's gone. The right to own property, that's essentially gone. So you have to get permission from the government for almost everything. And if that is the definition of a police state, that you can't do anything unless the government gives you permission, we're well on our way. This is something that people eventually, I hope, will get sick and tired of, and say enough is enough.”

Ron Paul (1935) American politician and physician

America: Freedom to Fascism, 2006 http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5355374476580235299&hl=en 2000s, 2006-2009

People, Hope, Way, Business

“George Orwell wrote in his "Notes on Nationalism" that, for the pacifist, the truth that, "Those who 'abjure' violence can only do so because others committing violence on their behalf," is obvious but impossible to accept.”

Jack Donovan (1974) American activist, editor and writer

Violence is Golden
A Sky Without Eagles (2014)

Truth

“If you go down a road that satisfies your personal predilections and relationships and sacrifices the common good of the country, including the elementary institution by which its civilization is sustained, then you're not only derelict in your public duty, you are abandoning your obligation as a human being. And frankly, people throw around words like "crime against humanity", I think that kind of disregard for the God-endowed natural rights of human being is the archetype of all crimes against humanity, and I think we have an entire elite faction that is now committed to committing such a crime against the American people.”

Alan Keyes (1950) American politician

2013-04-02
The Talk to Solomon Show Live, quoted in * 2013-04-02
Keyes: Marriage Equality is the 'Archetype of all Crimes Against Humanity'
Brian
Tashman
Right Wing Watch
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/keyes-marriage-equality-archetype-all-crimes-against-humanity
regarding Senator Rob Portman's support of same-sex marriage after learning that his son is gay.
2009

God, People, Nature, Thinking

“The pastorate was formed against a sort of intoxication of religious behavior, examples of which are found throughout the Middle East in the second, third, and fourth centuries, and to which certain Gnostic sects in particular bear striking and indisputable testimony. In at least some of these Gnostic sects, in fact, the identification of matter with evil, and as absolute evil, obviously entailed certain consequences. This might be, for example, a kind of vertigo or enchantment provoked by a sort of unlimited asceticism that could lead to suicide: freeing oneself from matter as quickly as possible. There is also the idea, the theme, of destroying matter through the exhaustion of the evils it contains, of committing every possible sin, going to the very end of the domain of evil opened up by matter, and thus destroying matter. Let us sin, then, and sin to infinity. There is also the theme of the nullification of the world of the law, to destroy which one must first destroy the law, that is to say, break every law. One must respond to every law established by the world, or by the powers of the world, by violating it, systematically breaking the law and in effect, overthrowing the reign of the one who created the world.”

Michel Foucault (1926–1984) French philosopher

Lecture 8 (1 March 1978), p. 195
Security, Population, Territory (1978)

World, Law, Behavior, Idea

“Confidence always pleases those who receive it. It is a tribute we pay to their merit, a deposit we commit to their trust, a pledge which gives them a claim upon us, a kind of dependence to which we voluntarily submit. I do not wish from what I have said to depreciate confidence, so necessary to man.”

François de La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680) French author of maxims and memoirs

Reflections on Various Subjects (1665–1678), I. On Confidence

Confidence, Dependency

“This death to the logic of emotional commitments of our chance moment in the world of space and time, this recognition of, the shift of our emphasis to, the universal life that throbs and celebrates its victory in the very kiss of our own annihilation, this amor fati, "love of fate," love of the fate that is inevitably death, constitutes the experience of the tragic art…”

Joseph Campbell book The Hero with a Thousand Faces

Source: The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949), Chapter 2

Love, Life, Death, Fate

“I'm torn by two perspectives in this regard. One is that the Palestinians have no interest whatsoever in establishing peace, and that the pathway to peace is almost unthinkable to accomplish. […] And I look at the Palestinians not wanting to see peace anyway, for political purposes, committed to the destruction and elimination of Israel, and these thorny issues, and I say, "There's just no way." And so what you do is you say, "You move things along the best way you can." You hope for some degree of stability, but you recognize that this is going to remain an unsolved problem. We live with that in China and Taiwan. All right, we have a potentially volatile situation but we sort of live with it, and we kick the ball down the field and hope that ultimately, somehow, something will happen and resolve it.”

Mitt Romney (1947) American businessman and politician

on the
2012

Peace, Hope, Way, Problem

“Hey, Neil, a reporter asked me would I appoint a Muslim to my administration. I did say no, and here's why. The reporter didn't tell you this. I would have to have people totally committed to the Declaration and the Constitution of the United States and the laws of this country.”

Herman Cain (1945) American writer, businessman and activist

People, Law, Country

“The Mosaic dispensation was better adapted to prevent the commission of sin than the Christian system. Under that dispensation, if you committed a sin, you had to bring a sacrifice—dove, sheep, or bullock, now, when a sin is committed, the Christian says, “Charge it,” “Put it on the slate, If I don’t pay it the Savior will.” In this way, rascality is sold on a credit, and the credit system of religion breeds extravagance in sin. The Mosaic dispensation was based upon far better business principles. The debt had to be paid, and by the man who owed it. We are told that the sinner is in debt to God, and that the obligation is discharged by the Savior. The best that can be said of such a transaction is that the debt is transferred, not paid. As a matter of fact, the sinner is in debt to the person he has injured. If you injure a man, it is not enough to get the forgiveness of God—you must get the man’s forgiveness, you must get your own. If a man puts his hand in the fire and God forgives him, his hand will smart just as badly.”

Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer

Some Reasons Why (1881)

God, Religion, Way, Forgiveness

“It's bad to use words like 'genius' unless you are talking about the late Jean-Michel Basquiat, the black Chatterton of the 80s who, during a picturesque career as sexual hustler, addict and juvenile art-star, made a superficial mark on the cultural surface by folding the conventions of street graffiti into those of art brut before killing himself with an overdose at the age of twenty-seven. The first stage of Basquiat's fate, in the mid-80s, was to be effusively welcomed by an art industry so trivialized by fashion and blinded by money that it couldn't tell a scribble from a Leonardo. Its second stage was to be dropped by the same audience, when the novelty of his work wore off. The third was an attempt at apotheosis four years after his death, with a large retrospective at the Whitney Museum designed to sanitise his short, frantic life and position him as a kind of all-purpose, inflatable martyr-figure, thus restoring the dollar value of his oeuvre in a time of collapsing prices for American contemporary art. One contributor to the catalogue proclaimed that "Jean remains wrapped in the silent purple toga of immortality"; another opined that "he is as close to Goya as American painting has ever produced." A third, not to be outdone, extolled Basquiat's "punishing regime of self-abuse" as part of "the disciplines imposed by the principle of inverse ascetism to which he was so resolutely committed."”

Robert Hughes (1938–2012) Australian critic, historian, writer

These disciplines of inverse ascetism, one sees, mean shooting smack until you drop dead.
Page 195
Culture of Complaint (1993)

Life, Death, Money, Fate

“I'd rather see what makes me different as something almost congenital. And I have these inklings that what you commit or endure in this world, relates to some kind of justice or balance. Maybe if you get a bad deal in this world, it is because of something you did, or were, in a previous life. Which is why I don't feel sorry for the poor.”

Nick Cave (1957) Australian musician

Blissed Out: The Raptures of Rock, by Simon Reynolds (1988)
Politics, society and humanity

Life, World, Justice, Feeling

“Theory is taught so as to make the student believe that he or she can become a Marxist, a feminist, an Afrocentrist, or a deconstructionist with about the same effort and commitment required in choosing items from a menu.”

Edward Said book Culture and Imperialism

Culture and Imperialism (1993), Chap 4, Sect 2

Effort

“Blind commitment to a theory is not an intellectual virtue: it is an intellectual crime.
:”

Imre Lakatos (1921–1974) Hungarian mathematician, philosopher

“Retirement security also depends upon keeping the commitments of Social Security, and we will. We must make Social Security financially stable and allow personal retirement accounts for younger workers who choose them.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2002, State of the Union address (January 2002)

Dependency, Personality

“[Q: do you believe that a nation should suffer a detrimental cost in order to compensate for wrongs committed by the governors of that nations, or by segments of that nation in the past? ] Suppose you're living under a dictatorship, and the dictators carry out some horrendous acts. So you're living in Stalinist Russia, let's say, and Stalin carries out horrible crimes. Are the people of Russia responsible for those crimes? Well, to only a very limited extent, because living under a brutal, harsh, terrorist regime, there isn't very much they can do about it. There's something they can do, and to the extent that you can do something, you're responsible for what happens. Suppose you're living in a free, democratic society, with lots of privilege, enormous, incomparable freedoms, and the government carries out violent, brutal acts. Are you responsible for it? Yeah, a lot more responsible, because there's a lot that you can do about it. If you share responsibility in criminal acts, you are liable for the consequences.”

Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist

Interview by Brian Lamb on C-SPAN, June 1, 2003 https://www.c-span.org/video/?176809-1/depth-noam-chomsky Quotes 2000s, 2003

People, Freedom, Suffering, Past

“What would happen if everyone did it? If everyone gave their wealth away what would we do for capital? If everyone loved their enemies who would ward off the Communists? This argument could be met on other levels, but here our only point is to observe that such reasoning would have been preposterous in the early church and remains ludicrous whenever committed Christians accept realistically their minority status. Far more fitting than "What if everybody did it" would be its inverse, "What if nobody else acted like a Christian, but we did?"”

John Howard Yoder (1927–1997) 20th century American Mennonite theologian

Source: The Priestly Kingdom (1984), p. 139

Love, Wealth

“Whether it is committed by a group operating within or without the law, terrorism is still terrorism.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

“In Defense of Obama’s Apologizing,” http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=551 WorldNetDaily.com, May 21, 2010. 2010s, 2010

Law

“I have committed the worst sin that can be committed. I have not been happy.”

Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986) Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator, and a key figure in Spanish language literature

He cometido el peor pecado que uno puede cometer. No he sido feliz.
"El Remordimiento" [Remorse] in La moneda de hierro [The Iron Coin], as quoted in Borges at Eighty : Conversations (1982) edited by Willis Barnstone, also in Hispanic Literature Criticism : Allende to Jiménez (1994), p. 298

Happiness

“The United States government does not authorise or condone torture of detainees. Torture, and conspiracy to commit torture, are crimes under US law, wherever they may occur in the world.”

Condoleezza Rice (1954) American Republican politician; U.S. Secretary of State; political scientist

In response to the allegation that the U.S. has operated secret CIA prisons in Eastern Europe http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4500630.stm, December 5, 2005.

World, Law

“This I (still) believe:
Fire is not necessarily your friend. Neither are dogs. Things with lit fuses should not be held onto. Beware the savage croquet ball. If it is -30 out, put on a coat before you leave the house. Just because the snow keeps you from seeing other objects the objects do not cease to exist. Clotheslines are the enemy of the bicyclist. If you don't remember how you got on the ground or where the blood came from, don't get up right away. Gym teachers think it's funny to commit assault with a baseball so don't day-dream during PE even if they have you so far in the outfield there are DEW line posts on either side of you. All guns are loaded. So are many bows. Trebuchets are for outside use only…”

James Nicoll (1961) Canadian fiction reviewer

Facebook post (2014) https://www.facebook.com/james.nicoll.927/posts/10152710405547985 2010s

Dogs, Dreams, Thinking, Teachers

“Commitment to great causes makes great men.”

Billy Graham (1918–2018) American Christian evangelist

"A Time for Moral Courage", Reader’s Digest (July 1964)

Men

“Global Warming knows no border. It does not discriminate. It affects us all. And we are here today, because we are all committed to take action.”

Lars Løkke Rasmussen (1964) Danish politician

From his opening address at United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen December 7, 2009.
2000s, 2009

“Jeff Gannon: Since there have been so many questions about what the President was doing over 30 years ago, what is it that he did after his honorable discharge from the National Guard? Did he make speeches alongside Jane Fonda, denouncing America's racist war in Vietnam? Did he testify before Congress that American troops committed war crimes in Vietnam? And did he throw somebody else's medals at the White House to protest a war America was still fighting? What was he doing after he was honorably discharged?
Scott McClellan: We've already commented on some of his views relating back to that period the other day.”

Scott McClellan (1968) Former White House press secretary

Source: Press briefing http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2004/02/20040210-3.html, February 10, 2004

War, Question, Fight, Housing

“If nothing else, we are committed to failing in a new way.”

Elon Musk (1971) South African-born American entrepreneur

Conversation: Elon Musk on Wired Science (2007)

Way

“… the impulse of iconoclasmː refusing unconditional reality and value to the contingent and flawed worlds we build and affirming that there will always be more in us, individually and collectively, than there can ever be in them. The most complete expression of this iconoclastic commitment is the development of forms of life and consciousness that provide us with the means and occasions to resist and reform them. In this way, they save us from having to choose between engaging wholeheartedly in them and keeping the last word, of resistance and transcendence, to ourselves.”

Roberto Mangabeira Unger book The Self Awakened: Pragmatism Unbound

Source: The Self Awakened: Pragmatism Unbound (2007), p. 70

Life, World, Way, Reality

“Those who follow orders to commit such crimes will be found and they will be punished. War crimes will be prosecuted. And it will be no excuse to say, 'I was just following orders.' Any official involved in such crimes will forfeit hope of amnesty or leniency with respect to past action.”

Donald Rumsfeld (1932) U.S. Secretary of Defense

Pentagon briefing, March 20, 2003 http://www.defenselink.mil/Transcripts/Transcript.aspx?TranscriptID=2072 2000s

War, Hope, Past

“(The lockout) makes no sense unless you put it in the context of a wider strategy, which is to somehow weaken Canadians' commitment to Canada Post so that ultimately, when the government gets out there to privatize it, they think they can get the public on their side”

Jack Layton (1950–2011) Leader of the New Democratic Party of Canada

Feds using lockout as wedge to privatize Canada Post: Layton http://www.canada.com/news/Feds+using+lockout+wedge+privatize+Canada+Post+Layton/4965556/story.html June 17, 2011

Thinking, Sense

“The destiny of India is the destiny of the masses of the vast population that inhabit this country, and every citizen has a meaningful role in shaping that destiny. There is a sacred duty cast on all of us – not written down in laws, but which is inherent – that we stand by this commitment.”

V. V. Giri (1894–1980) Indian politician and 4th president of India

Source: Presidents of India, 1950-2003, P.84

Law, Country

“Let us be clear. Prison works. It ensures that we are protected from murderers, muggers and rapists, and it makes many who are tempted to commit crime think twice.”

Michael Howard (1941) British politician

Colin Brown, "Howard seeks to placate 'angry majority'", The Independent, October 7, 1993
Speech to the Conservative Party conference, October 6, 1993

Thinking

“It's mind-boggling to consider that movies this bad are actually committed to film. The poor quality of The Pest in almost every category — humor, intelligence, creativity, and just plain entertainment value — ranks it somewhere between a bad infomercial and a local cable newscast. Rarely do I consider the act of seeing a movie to be a chore, but this kind of experience is the exception - Directed By Paul Miller.”

James Berardinelli (1967) American film critic

Review http://www.reelviews.net/movies/p/pest.html of The Pest (1997). Zero star reviews

Intelligence

“It's a big mistake to think that your own cause, or your own country, or your own side has God in its corner. For one thing, it commits the sin of pride.”

Christopher Hitchens (1949–2011) British American author and journalist

Christopher Hitchens vs. William Dembski, 18/11/2010 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctuloBOYolE&t=14m12s 2010s, 2010

God, Thinking, Country

“We believe in a nation under God, a nation indivisible, a nation united, a nation with justice and liberty for all. And for that to happen, we're going to have to have a new president that will commit to getting America working again; that will commit to a strong military; that will commit to a nation under God that recognizes that we the American people were given our rights not by government, but by God himself.”

Mitt Romney (1947) American businessman and politician

campaign speech at Military Aviation Museum, Virginia Beach, , quoted in [2012-09-08, Ashley, Parker, In Romney’s Hands, Pledge of Allegiance Is Framework for Criticism, The New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/09/us/politics/romney-uses-pledge-of-allegiance-to-criticize-obama.html, 2012-09-18]
quoting and paraphrasing the Pledge of Allegiance
regarding a draft of the Democratic Party's national platform replacing the phrase "God-given potential" with "talent and drive"
2012

God, People, Justice, Strong

“Today, having come far in our own historical journey, we must decide. Will we turn back, or finish well? Before history is written down in books, it is written in courage. Like Americans before us, we will show that courage and we will finish well. We will lead freedom's advance. We will compete and excel in the global economy. We will renew the defining moral commitments of this land, and so we move forward, optimistic about our country, faithful to its cause, and confident of victories to come.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2006, State of the Union (January 2006)

Books, Faith, Confidence, History

“According to some of the pious writers of antiquity, they made large fires, which might be seen at a great distance, upon the vigil of this saint [John], in token that he was said in holy writ to be "a shining light." Others, agreeing with this, add also, these fires were made to drive away the dragons and evil spirits hovering in the air; and one of them gravely says, in some countries they burned bones, which was called a bone-fire; for "the dragons hattyd nothyng mor than the styncke of brenyng bonys." This, says another, habent ex gentilibus, they have from the heathens. The author last cited laments the abuses committed upon thes occasions. "this vigil," says he, "ought to be held with cheerfulness and piety, but not with such merriment as is shewn by the profane lovers of this world, who make great fires in the streets, and indulge themselves with filthy and unlawful games, to which they add glotony and drunkenness, and the commission of many other shameful indecencies."”

Joseph Strutt (1749–1802) British engraver, artist, antiquary and writer

pg. 360
The Sports and Pastimes of the People of England (1801), Bonfires

World, Game, Lovers, Light

“It was the tragedy of modernist artists, Left or Right, that the much more effective political commitment of their own mass movements and politicians - not to mention their adversaries - rejected them. With the partial exception of Futurist-influenced Italian fascism, the new authoritarian regimes of both Right and Left preferred old-fashioned and gigantic monumental buildings and vistas in architecture, inspirational representations in both painting and sculpture, elaborate performances of the classics on stage, and ideological acceptability in literature.”

Eric Hobsbawm book The Age of Extremes

The Arts 1914-1945
The Age of Extremes (1992)

Literature, Fashion, Painting

“So it is in that spirit that I declare this afternoon to the people of Cuba that those who seek refuge here in America will find it. The dedication of America to our traditions as an asylum for the oppressed is going to be upheld. I have directed the Departments of State and Justice and Health, Education, and Welfare to immediately make all the necessary arrangements to permit those in Cuba who seek freedom to make an orderly entry into the United States of America. Our first concern will be with those Cubans who have been separated from their children and their parents and their husbands and their wives and that are now in this country. Our next concern is with those who are imprisoned for political reasons. And I will send to the Congress tomorrow a request for supplementary funds of $12,600,000 to carry forth the commitment that I am making today. I am asking the Department of State to seek through the Swiss government immediately the agreement of the Cuban government in a request to the President of the International Red Cross Committee. The request is for the assistance of the Committee in processing the movement of refugees from Cuba to Miami. Miami will serve as a port of entry and a temporary stopping place for refugees as they settle in other parts of this country. And to all the voluntary agencies in the United States, I appeal for their continuation and expansion of their magnificent work. Their help is needed in the reception and the settlement of those who choose to leave Cuba. The Federal Government will work closely with these agencies in their tasks of charity and brotherhood. I want all the people of this great land of ours to know of the really enormous contribution which the compassionate citizens of Florida have made to humanity and to decency. And all States in this Union can join with Florida now in extending the hand of helpfulness and humanity to our Cuban brothers. The lesson of our times is sharp and clear in this movement of people from one land to another. Once again, it stamps the mark of failure on a regime when many of its citizens voluntarily choose to leave the land of their birth for a more hopeful home in America. The future holds little hope for any government where the present holds no hope for the people. And so we Americans will welcome these Cuban people. For the tides of history run strong, and in another day they can return to their homeland to find it cleansed of terror and free from fear. Over my shoulders here you can see Ellis Island, whose vacant corridors echo today the joyous sound of long ago voices. And today we can all believe that the lamp of this grand old lady is brighter today; and the golden door that she guards gleams more brilliantly in the light of an increased liberty for the people from all the countries of the globe. Thank you very much.”

Lyndon B. Johnson (1908–1973) American politician, 36th president of the United States (in office from 1963 to 1969)

1960s, Remarks at the signing of the Immigration Bill (1965)

Children, People, Health, Education

“Swedish politicians are not right about much, but you get the impression they think they're setting the example to the rest of us. And they are right about that. Their recent bizarre decision to recognize 'Palestine' – a country that doesn't exist – is somewhat poignant: as the way things are going Sweden itself won't exist much longer. Seems like every piece of news that comes out of that country is more disturbing than the last. But, then, they have been committing cultural suicide so enthusiastically for so long there is now almost a sense that a tipping point is being reached and that, for the rest of us, it's really just a matter of watching the grim process unfold as we thank our lucky stars we don't live there… In Sweden today, democracy is a threat that must be neutralised, just as free speech is a threat that must be criminalised. Like the old Soviet Union, they can't afford to allow either because they're attempting to create an artificial society from a blueprint that doesn't stand up to scrutiny. And they've given it an almost theological significance so that a dogma has been established, and this has led, inevitably, to heresy becoming a problem. So now anyone in Sweden who expresses the wrong opinion about Muslim immigration is liable to be arrested, that's if the police are not too busy running away from violent Muslims.”

Pat Condell (1949) Stand-up comedian, writer, and Internet personality

"Sweden — Ship of fools" (13 October 2014) https://youtube.com/watch/?v=RZsvdg1dkJ4 2014

Way, Democracy, Star, Business

“But I do think we need to explore the commitment problem, which has caused many women to mistakenly conclude that men, as a group, have the emotional maturity of hamsters. This is not the case. A hamster is MUCH more capable of making a lasting commitment to a woman, especially if she gives it those little food pellets. Whereas a guy, in a relationship, will consume the pellets of companionship, and he will run on the exercise wheel of lust; but as soon as he senses that the door of commitment is about to close and trap him in the wire cage of true intimacy, he'll squirm out, scamper across the kitchen floor of uncertainty and hide under the refrigerator of Non-Readiness.”

Dave Barry (1947) American writer

Column, August 18, 1991
Columns and articles

Women, Men, Food, Guy

“We want people to remember what should be remembered on how fraud was committed to rob FPJ of his rightful place in history and on how people who voted for him of their political rights to install the president of their choice were also cheated.”

Francis Escudero (1969) Filipino politician

The Philippine Star http://www.philstar.com/headlines/708346/afp-garci-help-bring-closure-fraud-issue 2011

People, History, Fraud, Cheating

“Great leaders recognize that companies must innovate to remain competitive, and they nurture environments that encourage creative thinking… Innovation is rarely accidental — it takes an organizational commitment that starts at the executive level. The idea is not enough. As Thomas Edison said, innovation is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. Too often companies forget the ‘perspiration’ or execution part of the equation.”

Gregory Balestrero (1947) American industrial engineer

Balestrero (2008) quoted in: "America the Innovator The New Rules for Global Market Growth" http://www.forbesspecialsections.com/SectionPDFs/PMIAmericaInnov.pdf By Karen A. Edelman. Forbes : A Special Advertising Section. Accessed 3 Dec 2008. 2000s

Idea, Thinking, Parting, Forgetting

“She left one too many a boy behind
He committed suicide”

Bob Dylan (1941) American singer-songwriter, musician, author, and artist

Song lyrics, The Bootleg Series Vol. 9: The Witmark Demos: 1962–1964 (2010), Gypsy Lou (recorded 1963)

Boy, Suicide

“SWA Magazine: Talking about spacecraft, what do you think about the shuttle program?
Asimov: Well, I hope it does get off the ground. And I hope they expand it, because the shuttle program is the gateway to everything else. By means of the shuttle, we will be able to build space stations and power stations, laboratory facilities and habitations, and everything else in space.
SWA Magazine: How about orbital space colonies? Do you see these facilities being built or is the government going to cut back on projects like this?
Asimov: Well, now you've put your finger right on it. In order to have all of these wonderful things in space, we don't have to wait for technology - we've got the technology, and we don't have to wait for the know-how - we've got that too. All we need is the political go-ahead and the economic willingness to spend the money that is necessary. It is a little frustrating to think that if people concentrate on how much it is going to cost they will realize the great amount of profit they will get for their investment. Although they are reluctant to spend a few billions of dollars to get back an infinite quantity of money, the world doesn't mind spending $400 billion every years on arms and armaments, never getting anything back from it except a chance to commit suicide.”

Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, known for his works of science fiction …

An Interview with Isaac Asimov (1979)

Money, People, World, Hope

“Authoritarian Communism is, and should be, forever tainted by those real-world laboratories. But what of the contemporary crusade to liberate world markets? The coups, wars and slaughters to instill and maintain pro-corporate regimes have never been treated as capitalist crimes but have instead been written off as the excess of overzealous dictators, as hot fronts in the Cold War, and now of the War on Terror. If the most committed opponents of the corporatist economic model are systematically eliminated, whether in Argentina in the seventies or in Iraq today, that suppression is explained as part of the dirty fight against Communism or terrorism - almost never as the fight for the advancement of pure capitalism.”

Naomi Klein (1970) Canadian author and activist

The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism (2007)

War, World, Communication, Fight

“As Adolf Berle, a fellow cold warrior, once remarked, 'Being vindicated by history is cold comfort.' For one thing, the political scars of those with whom one has polemicized seem more long-lasting and painful than their memories of the political issues that gave rise to them. And yet indifference to the political life of one's times I deem a flagrant expression of moral irresponsibility. Those who profess such indifference owe the intellectual and cultural freedoms in which they luxuriate to the commitment and sacrifices of others.”

Sidney Hook (1902–1989) American philosopher

Out of Step (1985)

Life, Pain, History, Freedom

“In general the claim can be supported that a view of classical political economy as committed to extreme laissez-faire or unmitigated economic individualism misrepresents or at the very least analytically overgeneralizes their circumscribed theoretical and practical aims. In general then, with regard to both political and economic liberty, the classical political economists might be seen to be united in their efforts to theorize and systematize the productive and allocating functions of the mechanism of the market as the most efficient means to engender the growth of wealth. At the same time, classicals such as Smith, Malthus, Ricardo, and Mill recognized that the market, of necessity, operated in a larger context of restriction – not only legal, but equally as important, within political, religious, moral, and conventional restrictions – which could not be readily or in some cases even desirably overcome.”

Shannon C. Stimson (1951) American political theorist

"Classical Political Economy", in Coole, Diana H.; Gibbons, Michael; Ellis, Elisabeth et al., The encyclopedia of political thought (2014); see also Adam Smith

Support, Effort, Time, Wealth

“Seventeen years after its initial release, The Empire Strikes Back is still as thrilling and involving as ever. Because of the high quality of the original product, it doesn't show a hint of dating. Neither [Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope nor Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi] were able to match the narrative scope of Empire, which today remains one of the finest and most rousing science fiction tales ever committed to the screen.”

James Berardinelli (1967) American film critic

Review http://www.reelviews.net/movies/s/sw2.html of Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980). Four star reviews

War, Hope, Star, Science

“Notwithstanding this politico-cultural reality, early Indian nationalists sought to inculcate a spirit of inclusivity and accommodation into the emergent socio-political discourse. As the freedom movement developed however, the Muslim League articulated an ideology committed wholly to its Islamic fountainhead and stressed the need to maintain the community’s political dominance in the country. The League’s refusal or failure to come to terms with the forces of modernization ushered in by the British further pushed it on a trajectory away from the national mainstream.”

Meenakshi Jain Indian historian

"Power Equations in Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Century India: the Empirical Backdrop to Nationalism", International Forum for India's Heritage, 2003.

Communication, Failure, Reality, Freedom

“If there be ground for you to trust, as you do, in your own righteousness, then all that Christ did to purchase salvation, and all that God did from the fall of man to prepare the way for it, is in vain. Consider what greater folly could you have devised to charge upon God than this, that all those things were done so needlessly; when, instead of all this, He might only have called you forth, and committed the business to you, which you think you can do so easily.”

Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758) Christian preacher, philosopher, and theologian

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 540.

God, Way, Business, Thinking

“Whereas traditional Christianity calls for the subordination of all other commitments to the commitment to God, Buddhism teaches us to give up all craving and attachment, just those aspects of the human psyche that ground economism.”

John B. Cobb (1925) American theologian

Eastern View of Economics http://web.archive.org/web/20150906075839/http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=3607

God

“Money as a medium of exchange becomes important when workers are paid in medium of exchange rather than in wage goods directly. Since wage goods constitute the majority of goods produced (particularly in the early stages of development), it is tempting (but misleading) to focus on exchanges and on money as a medium of exchange [like the neo-classicals]. Once capitalist production dominates the economy, money becomes universally important: money operates as a medium of exchange and money hoards provide a measure of security. However, production involves goods and services now in exchange for a promise to pay in the future. That is, money is involved in the production process because production is time-based and involves debt commitments. If one only focuses on the use of money in exchange or as a store of value, one ignores how money creation is inextricably related to time-based production in private property economies.”

L. Randall Wray (1953) American economist

Source: Money and Credit in Capitalist Economies, 1990, p. 10; Cited in Howard Stein. "Theories of institutions and economic reform in Africa." World Development 22.12 (1994): 1833-1849.

Money, Universe, Time, Future

“Sandy Koufax. Sandy was a special problem for me because he possessed exceptional control, speed and a great curve ball. He was highly disciplined, extremely committed and a very private person. These qualities enabled him to concentrate on his profession without a lot of unnecessary distractions.”

Ernie Banks (1931–2015) American baseball player and coach

Responding to the question, "Who was the toughest pitcher you faced during your career, and why was he a special problem for you?"; as quoted in "Hall of Famers Name Their Toughest Diamond Foes" by William Guilfoile, in The 1991 National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum Yearbook; reprinted in Baseball Digest (August 1992), p. 28

Problem, Personality, Speed

“We are never such kleptomaniacs as in our juvenilia. We steal from our masters. We steal from our friends, from our enemies even. We try out tones of voice for which we are ill suited. We write as if we belong to some other period. We are suckers for gorgeous words such as nenuphar, asphodel, and pelf. And because we are not yet in command of our vehicle we get out of control. We reveal ourselves inadvertently and we inadvertently commit ourselves to some point of view that really isn't "us" at all.”

James Fenton (1949) poet

"Wilfred Owen's Juvenilia" (p. 26)
The Strength of Poetry: Oxford Lectures (2001)

“I want to assure the people that Gujarat shall not tolerate any such accident. The culprits will get full punishment for their sins. Not only this, we will set an example, that nobody not even in his dream, thinks of committing a heinous crime like this.”

Narendra Modi (1950) Prime Minister of India

Cited in: Caroline Sweetman (2005) Gender, Peacebuilding, and Reconstruction. p. 94
2002, "When select phrases are lifted and distorted out of context", 2002

People, Dreams, Thinking

“But the most lasting agony of this war was suffered, not by the defeated, but by the victors. For when their passion had cooled the Americans could not easily disguise from themselves that they had committed murder. They were not at heart a brutal folk, but rather a kindly. They liked to think of the world as a place of innocent pleasure-seeking, and of themselves as the main purveyors of delight. Yet they had been somehow drawn into this fantastic crime; and henceforth an all-pervading sense of collective guilt warped the American mind. They had ever been vainglorious and intolerant; but now these qualities in them became extravagant even to insanity. Both as individuals and collectively, they became increasingly frightened of criticism, increasingly prone to blame and hate, increasingly self-righteous, increasingly hostile to the critical intelligence, increasingly superstitious.”

Olaf Stapledon book Last and First Men

Source: Last and First Men (1930), Chapter II: Europe’s Downfall; Section 3, “Europe Murdered” (p. 41)

Hate, Hostility, War, Pleasure

“Hal: Bury her naked? My own mum? It's a Freudian nightmare.
Dennis: I won't disagree.
Hal: Aren't we committing some kind of unforgivable sin?
Dennis: Only if you're a Catholic.
Hal: I am a Catholic. I can't undress her. She's a relative. I can go to Hell for it.
Dennis: I'll undress her then. I don't believe in Hell.
Hal: That's typical of your upbringing, baby. Every luxury was lavished on you - atheism, breast-feeding, circumcision. I had to make my own way.”

Joe Orton (1933–1967) English playwright and author

Loot (1965), Act I

Way, Hell, Baby

“My call tonight is for every American to commit at least two years — 4,000 hours over the rest of your lifetime, to the service of your neighbors and your nation. Many are already serving, and I thank you. If you aren't sure how to help, I've got a good place to start. To sustain and extend the best that has emerged in America, I invite you to join the new USA Freedom Corps. The Freedom Corps will focus on three areas of need: responding in case of crisis at home; rebuilding our communities; and extending American compassion throughout the world.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2002, State of the Union address (January 2002)

World, Home, Communication, Freedom

“Likewise, police officers on patrol in our nation’s cities often work in environments where a hugely disproportionate percentage of street crime is committed by young men of color. Something happens to people of good will working in that environment. After years of police work, officers often can’t help but be influenced by the cynicism they feel.”

James Comey (1960) American lawyer and the seventh director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)

2010s, Hard Truths: Law Enforcement (2015)

Men, People, Color, Feeling

“Prison itself is a tremendous education in the need for patience and perseverance. It is above all a test of one's commitment.”

Nelson Mandela (1918–2013) President of South Africa, anti-apartheid activist

1990s, Long Walk to Freedom (1995)

Education, Patience, Perseverance

“Our nation should always derive its character directly from the people and let this be the strength and the image to be presented to the world — the character of the American people.
To our friends and allies I say that what unites us through our common dedication to democracy is much more important than that which occasionally divides us on economics or politics. To the nations that seek to lift themselves from poverty I say that America shares your aspirations and extends its hand to you. To those nation-states that wish to compete with us I say that we neither fear competition nor see it as an obstacle to wider cooperation. To all people I say that after two hundred years America still remains confident and youthful in its commitment to freedom and equality, and we always will be.”

Jimmy Carter (1924) American politician, 39th president of the United States (in office from 1977 to 1981)

Pre-Presidency, First Presidential Nomination Acceptance Speech (1976)

People, Youth, World, Fear

“It makes no sense to tell the enemy when you plan to start withdrawing. All the terrorists would have to do is mark their calendars and gather their strength -- and begin plotting how to overthrow the government and take control of the country of Iraq. I believe setting a deadline for withdrawal would demoralize the Iraqi people, would encourage killers across the broader Middle East, and send a signal that America will not keep its commitments. Setting a deadline for withdrawal is setting a date for failure -- and that would be irresponsible.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

President Bush Rejects Artificial Deadline, Vetoes Iraq War Supplemental http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2007/05/20070501-6.html (May 1, 2007) 2000s, 2007

People, Failure, Sense, Country

“There's a tremendous tendency not to make a statement, not to be committed in that ultimate sense. Photo-realism is the same thing as minimal abstraction. Both are unwilling to say anything about the nature of reality, about their own involvement with reality, the evolvement of forms, their expressive…their deepest involvement with human reality.”

Leonard Baskin (1922–2000) American sculptor

Leonard Baskin Interview (1996) Discussing the State of Contemporary Art. in: Don Gray " Art Essays, Art Criticism & Poems http://jessieevans-dongrayart.com/essays/essay028.html" at jessieevans-dongrayart.com

Photo, Nature, Reality, Sense