Quotes about governance (7013 quotes, page 50)

“We have been attempting to relieve ourselves and the other nations from the old theory of competitive armaments. In spite of all the arguments in favor of great military forces, no nation ever had an army large enough to guarantee it against attack in time of peace or to insure its victory in time of war. No nation ever will. Peace and security are more likely to result from fair and honorable dealings, and mutual agreements for a limitation of armaments among nations, than by any attempt at competition in squadrons and battalions. No doubt this country could, if it wished to spend more money, make a better military force, but that is only part of the problem which confronts our Government. The real question is whether spending more money to make a better military force would really make a better country. I would be the last to disparage the military art. It is an honorable and patriotic calling of the highest rank. But I can see no merit in any unnecessary expenditure of money to hire men to build fleets and carry muskets when international relations and agreements permit the turning of such resources into the making of good roads, the building of better homes, the promotion of education, and all the other arts of peace which minister to the advancement of human welfare. Happily, the position of our country is such among the other nations of the world that we have been and shall be warranted in proceeding in this direction.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Toleration and Liberalism (1925)

Men , Money , War , World

“Now the problem with that theory in my opinion as a First Amendment lawyer who has been doing this for 25 years is that what you’re really saying is that a successful private company is converted into public property and regulated by the government because it is so successful and ubiquitous. And I think that’s an argument conservatives need to think carefully about. Do we really want every private company that’s successful and that has a lot of market share to be called public property for the purposes of regulation and subject to all the regulations that occur, not just the First Amendment but a bunch of other regulations. I think that’s a big question mark.”

Harmeet Dhillon (1969) American lawyer

Harmeet Dhillon: ‘It’s a Great Time to Be a Tech Lobbyist’ http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2018/03/28/harmeet-dhillon/ (Mar 27, 2018)

Question , Problem , Thinking , Success

“This is the time not just for this Government– or, indeed, for this Prime Minister—but for this House to give a lead: to show that we will stand up for what we know to be right; to show that we will confront the tyrannies and dictatorships and terrorists who put our way of life at risk; to show, at the moment of decision, that we have the courage to do the right thing.”

Tony Blair (1953) former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Hansard http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200203/cmhansrd/vo030318/debtext/30318-09.htm#30318-09_spmin2, House of Commons, 6th series, vol. 301, cols. 773-774.
Conclusion of speech in the House of Commons debate on Iraq, 18 March 2003.
2000s

Life , Way , Courage , Decision

“But inequality of representation in both Houses of our legislature, is not the only republican heresy in this first essay of our revolutionary patriots at forming a constitution. For let it be agreed that a government is republican in proportion as every member composing it has his equal voice in the direction of its concerns (not indeed in person, which would be impracticable beyond the limits of a city, or small township, but) by representatives chosen by himself, and responsible to him at short periods, and let us bring to the test of this canon every branch of our constitution.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

1810s, Letter to H. Tompkinson (AKA Samuel Kercheval) (1816)

Housing , Personality

“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

“But one problem remains. How can the conspiracy-minded Modern Democratic Party Women be assured that the switch was made? It is true that not many people would see the new bills and so some doubt might arise among the Democratic sisterhood about whether Wilson was really removed and then replaced on the bill by the three ladies named above. There is only one sure-fire means of relieving the Modern Democratic Party Women of their doubts before the whining starts. That means is to have the Democratic National Committee direct its current icon, Hilary Clinton, to publicly report on who appears on the $100,000 note each time she and her husband receive a packet of those bills from one or another of the foreign governments for which they are apparently selling out American interests. After all, if you cannot trust America’s graft-taker-in-chief, who can you trust?”

Michael Scheuer (1952) American counterterrorism analyst

As quoted in Michael Scheuer's Non-Intervention http://non-intervention.com/1689/democrats-scourge-the-south-after-the-battle-flag-it%e2%80%99s-on-to-old-hickory/ (9 July 2015), by M. Scheuer.
2010s

Women , People , Problem , Appearance

“Our purpose is not — and shall never be-either the quest for power or the desire to punish. We seek to increase the power of the people over all their governments, not to enhance the power of the Federal Government over any of the people. For the life of this Republic, our people have zealously guarded their liberty against abuses of power by their governments. The one weapon they have used is the mightiest weapon in the arsenal of democracy — the vote. This has been enough, for as Woodrow Wilson said, "The instrument of all reform in America is the ballot."”

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

1960s, Special message to Congress on the right to vote (1965)

Life , People , Democracy

“Some recent scholars have proposed that Jesus … preached a "radically egalitarian society"—that is, that he set about to reform society by inventing a new set of rules to govern social relations … There is little to suggest that Jesus was concerned with pushing social "reform" in any fundamental way in this evil age. In his view, present-day society and all its conventions were soon to come to a screeching halt, when the Son of Man arrived from heaven in judgment on the earth. Far from transforming society from within, Jesus was preparing people for the destruction of society. Only when God's Kingdom arrived would an entirely new order appear, in which peace, equality, and justice would reign supreme.”

Bart D. Ehrman book Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium

Source: Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium (1999), Ch. 11: 'Not in Word Only', p. 190

God , People , Age , Peace

“A pure Democracy, by which I mean a Society consisting of a small number of citizens, who assemble and administer the Government in person, can admit of no cure for the mischiefs of faction. A common passion or interest will, in almost every case, be felt by a majority of the whole; a communication and concert result from the form of Government itself; and there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party, or an obnoxious individual. Hence it is, that such Democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security, or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives, as they have been violent in their deaths. Theoretic politicians, who have patronized this species of Government, have erroneously supposed, that by reducing mankind to a perfect equality in their political rights, they would, at the same time, be perfectly equalized and assimilated in their possessions, their opinions, and their passions.”

James Madison (1751–1836) 4th president of the United States (1809 to 1817)

Federalist No. 10
1780s, Federalist Papers (1787–1788)

Death , Democracy , Communication , Passion

“What is government? From the outside it looks like a security system based on the marriage of land and people, From the inside, it looks like and attempts to create a community. A government is like an oyster, hard on the outside and soft on the inside, and the outside and inside are utterly dependent on each other.”

Elmer Eric Schattschneider (1892–1971) American political scientist

Source: Two Hundred Million Americans in Search of a Government (1969), p. 24

Marriage , People , Communication , Dependency

“I cannot help but protest in the strongest possible terms against the cartoon on page 3 of your publication of the 30th of December equating the present governments of Poland and Chile. It can only be explained by complete ignorance of the facts or by the systematically promoted socialist calumnies of the present situation in Chile, which I had not expected the F. A. Z. to fall for. I believe that all the participants in the Mont Pelerin Society conference held a few weeks ago in Chile would agree with me that you owe the Chilean government a humble apology for such twisting of the facts. Any Pole lucky enough to escape to Chile could consider himself fortunate.”

Friedrich Hayek (1899–1992) Austrian and British economist and Nobel Prize for Economics laureate

Letter to the editor of Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, on a cartoon comparing Pinochet's Chile to Jaruzelski's Poland, which was published on 6 January 1982
1980s and later

Help

“He awoke—and wanted Mars. The valleys, he thought. What would it be like to trudge among them? Great and greater yet: the dream grew as he became fully conscious, the dream and the yearning. He could almost feel the enveloping presence of the other world, which only Government agents and high officials had seen. A clerk like himself? Not likely.”

Philip K. Dick (1928–1982) American author

"We Can Remember It For You Wholesale"
The Phillip K. Dick Reader

World , Dreams , Feeling

“The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the larger centers has owned the Government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson — and I am not wholly excepting the Administration of W. W. The country is going through a repetition of Jackson's fight with the Bank of the United States — only on a far bigger and broader basis.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945) 32nd President of the United States

Letter to Col. Edward Mandell House (21 November 1933); as quoted in F.D.R.: His Personal Letters, 1928-1945, edited by Elliott Roosevelt (New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1950), pg. 373
1930s

Truth , Fight , Country

“The country does want rest, we all want rest. Our very civilization wants it — and we mean that it shall have it. It shall have rest — repose — refreshment of soul and re-invigoration of faculty. And that rest shall be of life and not of death. It shall not be a poison that pacifies restlessness in death, nor shall it be any kind of anodyne or patting or propping or bolstering — as if a man with a cancer in his breast would be well if he only said he was so and wore a clean shirt and kept his shoes tied. We want the rest of a real Union, not of a name, not of a great transparent sham, which good old gentlemen must coddle and pat and dandle, and declare wheedlingly is the dearest Union that ever was, SO it is; and naughty, ugly old fanatics shan't frighten the pretty precious — no, they sha'n't. Are we babies or men? This is not the Union our fathers framed — and when slavery says that it will tolerate a Union on condition that freedom holds its tongue and consents that the Constitution means first slavery at all costs and then liberty, if you can get it, it speaks plainly and manfully, and says what it means. There are not wanting men enough to fall on their knees and cry: 'Certainly, certainly, stay on those terms. Don't go out of the Union — please don't go out; we'll promise to take great care in future that you have everything you want. Hold our tongues? Certainly. These people who talk about liberty are only a few fanatics — they are tolerably educated, but most of 'em are crazy; we don't speak to them in the street; we don't ask them to dinner; really, they are of no account, and if you'll really consent to stay in the Union, we'll see if we can't turn Plymouth Rock into a lump of dough'. I don't believe the Southern gentlemen want to be fed on dough. I believe they see quite as clearly as we do that this is not the sentiment of the North, because they can read the election returns as well as we. The thoughtful men among them see and feel that there is a hearty abhorrence of slavery among us, and a hearty desire to prevent its increase and expansion, and a constantly deepening conviction that the two systems of society are incompatible. When they want to know the sentiment of the North, they do not open their ears to speeches, they open their eyes, and go and look in the ballot-box, and they see there a constantly growing resolution that the Union of the United States shall no longer be a pretty name for the extension of slavery and the subversion of the Constitution. Both parties stand front to front. Each claims that the other is aggressive, that its rights have been outraged, and that the Constitution is on its side. Who shall decide? Shall it be the Supreme Court? But that is only a co-ordinate branch of the government. Its right to decide is not mutually acknowledged. There is no universally recognized official expounder of the meaning of the Constitution. Such an instrument, written or unwritten, always means in a crisis what the people choose. The people of the United States will always interpret the Constitution for themselves, because that is the nature of popular governments, and because they have learned that judges are sometimes appointed to do partisan service.”

George William Curtis (1824–1892) American writer

1850s, The Present Aspect of the Slavery Question (1859)

Life , Death , Men , People

“Anybody can reduce taxes, but it is not so easy to stand in the gap and resist the passage of increasing appropriation bills which would make tax reduction impossible. It will be very easy to measure the strength of the attachment to reduced taxation by the power with which increased appropriations are resisted. If at the close of the present session the Congress has kept within the budget which I propose to present, it will then be possible to have a moderate amount of tax reduction and all the tax reform that the Congress may wish for during the next fiscal year. The country is now feeling the direct stimulus which came from the passage of the last revenue bill, and under the assurance of a reasonable system of taxation there is every prospect of an era of prosperity of unprecedented proportions. But it would be idle to expect any such results unless business can continue free from excess profits taxation and be accorded a system of surtaxes at rates which have for their object not the punishment of success or the discouragement of business, but the production of the greatest amount of revenue from large incomes. I am convinced that the larger incomes of the country would actually yield more revenue to the Government if the basis of taxation were scientifically revised downward. Moreover the effect of the present method of this taxation is to increase the cost of interest. on productive enterprise and to increase the burden of rent. It is altogether likely that such reduction would so encourage and stimulate investment that it would firmly establish our country in the economic leadership of the world.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Second State of the Union Address (1924)

World , Feeling , Business , Success

“In this highly competitive world, there is a crying need for the government to assure that schools in the country, for one, are able to produce graduates who have the capability to find quality work that mostly requires a sufficient level of technology skills.”

Francis Escudero (1969) Filipino politician

[www.philstar.com/headlines/2013/02/16/909422/chiz-wants-eco-growth-translated-jobs The Philippine Star]
2013, Mid-Term Campaign Trail

World , School , Cry , Country

“I thought I was a Conservative. I thought I was a Conservative, but all the time I was in favour of… I was in favour of shortcuts to Utopia. I was in favour of the government doing things, because I was so impatient for good things to be done.”

Keith Joseph (1918–1994) British barrister and politician

Interview in 1975, broadcast in "The Commanding Heights: The Battle of Ideas", PBS http://mksnyder.org/globalization/TCHVideoText/tchone13-19.htm.
1970s

Time

“Though the profusion of Government must undoubtedly have retarded the natural progress of England to wealth and improvement, it has not been able to stop it.”

Adam Smith (1723–1790) Scottish moral philosopher and political economist

Source: (1776), Book II, Chapter III.

Nature , Wealth

“Government programs once established never end, they just never end. The logic is evermore decision made by government and ever fewer decisions made by individuals. Democracy is an extraordinary thing, but Hitler could've been elected democratically. Democracy is not the same as liberty. It is not the same as individual rights.”

Alan Charles Kors (1943) American academic

2010s, Socialism's Legacy (2011), Q&A

Democracy , Decision

“As far as domestic democracy, all here present know that democracy means government of the people by the people. While we agree that consultation and participation are essential to every democracy, this is seldom achieved in practice.”

Alfred de Zayas (1947) American United Nations official

Statement by the Independent Expert on the Promotion of a Democratic and Equitable International Order, Prof. Dr. Alfred de Zayas. Brussels Conference on a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly, 16/17 October 2013 http://www.unpacampaign.org/documents/en/2013UNPA_zayas.pdf.
2014, UNPA - World Parliamentary Assembly

People , Democracy

“And a Government with Heart to ensure our country progresses without leaving anyone behind.”

Francis Escudero (1969) Filipino politician

2015, Speech: Declaration as Vice Presidential Candidate

Heart , Country

“The Bible declares blasphemy to be a very serious offense, because any society which begins by profaning God and His authority will soon profane all things. Nothing will be sacred. No authority will stand. The alternative to authority is total terror by the power of State. This is why, as I’ve pointed out more than once, when the authority of God is destroyed, and when the doctrine of Creation was replaced with the doctrine of Evolution, Marx and Engels congratulated one another in that now their position was established. The foundations of all godly authority were shattered when God was no longer viewed as the creator. His Law, His Word, His person became thereby irrelevant to creation. If the Lord God of scripture did not make the Heavens and the earth and all things therein to the last atom, His Word does not govern creation. If Creation is a product of Evolution, then no law outside of itself can govern it. So the alternative to the authority of God is total terror by the power of State. Where there is no authority, there is soon no justice, because men then no longer speak the same moral languages of law and authority. The respect for God’s authority establishes communication and healthy dissent, the kind of dissent which thrives in an anarchist situation is the dissent of increasing evil, violence and destruction. Godly dissent is constructive, not destructive, and its goal is justice and holiness.”

Rousas John Rushdoony (1916–2001) American theologian

Audio lectures, Blasphemy (n. d.)

Men , God , Justice , Law

“The FBI and the CIA, I really thought they had everything under control. I thought they knew what was going on with everybody. I thought they had a camera in the air in a satellite right now taking very accurate pictures of my prostate. I thought they had that kind of technology. I thought they knew everything about everybody, but it turns out they’re really no different than many other government bureaucracies, say, the Post Office or the Department of Motor Vehicles. Just, uh, you know, 50-60 year old men waiting for their pensions to kick in. Except for the three that let the attack [9/11] happen. They’ve been promoted.”

Marc Maron (1963) Comedian

Not Sold Out (2002)

Men , Waiting

“I have read your speech and I must frankly say, with much regret as there is little in it that I can agree with, and much from which I differ. You lay down broadly the Doctrine of Universal Suffrage which I can never accept. I intirely deny that every sane and not disqualified man has a moral right to a vote—I use that Expression instead of “the Pale of the Constitution”, because I hold that all who enjoy the Security and civil Rights which the Constitution provides are within its Pale—What every Man and Woman too have a Right to, is to be well governed and under just Laws, and they who propose a change ought to shew that the present organization does not accomplish those objects…[Your speech] was more like the Sort of Speech with which Bright would have introduced the Reform Bill which he would like to propose than the Sort of Speech which might have been expected from the Treasury bench in the present State of Things. Your Speech may win Lancashire for you, though that is doubtful but I fear it will tend to lose England for you. It is to be regretted that you should, as you stated, have taken the opportunity of your receiving a Deputation of working men, to exhort them to set on Foot an Agitation for Parliamentary Reform—The Function of a Government is to calm rather than to excite Agitation.”

Henry Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston (1784–1865) British politician

Letter to William Ewart Gladstone (12 May 1864), quoted in Philip Guedalla (ed.), Gladstone and Palmerston, being the Correspondence of Lord Palmerston with Mr. Gladstone 1851-1865 (London: Victor Gollancz, 1928), pp. 281-282.
1860s

Men , Fear , Law , Universe

“The greatest division this nation has ever seen were the conflicts of trade unions towards the end of a Labour Government…That trade union movement…used their power against their members. They made them come out on strike when they didn't want to. They loved secondary picketing. They went and demonstrated outside companies where there was no dispute whatsoever, and sometimes closed them down. They were acting as they were later in the coal strike, before my whole trade union laws were through of this Government. They were out to use their power to hold the nation to ransom, to stop power from getting to the whole of manufacturing industry to damage people's jobs, to stop power from getting to every house in the country, power, heat and light to every housewife, every child, every school, every pensioner. You want division; you want conflict; you want hatred. There it was. It was that which Thatcherism—if you call it that—tried to stop. Not by arrogance, but by giving power to the ordinary, decent, honourable, trade union member who didn’t want to go on strike. By giving power to him over the Scargills of this world.”

Margaret Thatcher (1925–2013) British stateswoman and politician

TV Interview for BBC1 Panorama (8 June 1987) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/106647
Second term as Prime Minister

Love , People , World , School

“After eight years in government, Mr Blair has precious little to show for his ambitious plans to heal the divisions in society.”

Melanie Phillips (1951) British journalist

http://www.melaniephillips.com/articles/archives/001442.html

“I believe that the Durbar, more than any event in modern history, showed to the Indian people the path which, under the guidance of Providence, they are treading, taught the Indian Empire its unity, and impressed the world with its moral as well as material force. It will not be forgotten. The sound of the trumpets has already died away; the captains and the kings have departed; but the effect produced by this overwhelmingly display of unity and patriotism is still alive and will not perish. Everywhere it is known that upon the throne of the East is seated a power that has made of the sentiments, the aspirations, and the interests of 300 millions of Asiatics a living thing, and the units in that great aggregation have learned that in their incorporation lies their strength. As a disinterested spectator of the Durbar remarked, Not until to-day did I realise that the destinies of the East still lie, as they always have done, in the hollow of India’s hand. I think, too, that the Durbar taught the lesson not only of power but of duty. There was not an officer of Government there present, there was not a Ruling Prince nor a thoughtful spectator, who must not at one moment or other have felt that participation in so great a conception carried with it responsibility as well as pride, and that he owed something in return for whatever of dignity or security or opportunity the Empire had given him.”

George Curzon, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston (1859–1925) British politician

Budget Speech (25 March 1903), quoted in Lord Curzon in India, Being A Selection from His Speeches as Viceroy & Governor-General of India 1898-1905 (London: Macmillan, 1906), pp. 308-309.

People , Lie , World , History

“I am in politics since the last 35 years, not once have I faced a charge of corruption. In last 35 years I have never ever changed my political track. I have always been what my party stands for. In last 35 years of public life wherever I have gone, whether it is the Ahmedabad district bank, the Gujarat State Fertilizer Corporation or in the government, I have tried to bring in reforms, new policies and able administration. I have a record of governance behind me.”

Amit Shah (1964) Indian politician

"Exclusive Amit Shah Interview: People are waiting to vote for Modi," 2013

Life , Change

“The outlook of a Bruno, a Kepler, or a Galileo is determined by the idea of a comprehensive, all-embracing unity of the physical world. The same law governs the courses of the stars, the falling of stones, and the flight of birds. This homogenization of the physical world with respect to the validity of law deprives the division of physical objects into rigid abstractly defined classes of the critical significance it had for Aristotelian physics, in which membership in a certain conceptual class was considered to determine the physical nature of an object.”

Kurt Lewin (1890–1947) German-American psychologist

Source: 1930s, A Dynamic Theory of Personality, 1935, p. 10 as cited in: Coleman Roberts Griffith (1943) Principles of systematic psychology. p. 215.

World , Law , Star , Idea

“It is impossible for us, with our limited means, to attempt to educate the body of the people. We must at present do our best to form a class who may be interpreters between us and the millions whom we govern,—a class of persons Indian in blood and colour, but English in tastes, in opinions, in morals and in intellect.”

Thomas Babington Macaulay, 1st Baron Macaulay (1800–1859) British historian and Whig politician

Minute on Education http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00generallinks/macaulay/txt_minute_education_1835.html (1835)

People , Education , Personality

“The Labour Party should oppose the Government arms plan root and branch.”

Aneurin Bevan (1897–1960) Welsh politician

Tribune, 19 February 1937.
1930s

“For domination has nothing whatsoever to do with good government, and power as an end in itself destroys good government.”

Pierre Stephen Robert Payne (1911–1983) British lecturer, novelist, historian, poet and biographer

The Five faces of Corruption, p. 45
The Corrupt Society - From Ancient Greece To Present-Day America (1975)

“The principles of Efficiency were first applied to war by Moltke. Result - the conquest of France in seven weeks.
Second, they were applied to manufacturing by Taylor, Emerson, and others. Result - lower costs, higher profits, higher wages, and nearly twice the output.
Third, they were applied to the Ordnance Department of the U. S. Government. Result - the official approval of the Government. (See report by Brigadier General William Crozier, Nov. 2, 1911.)”

Herbert N. Casson (1869–1951) Canadian journalist and writer

Herbert N. Casson Ads and Sales: A Study of Advertising and Selling, from the Standpoint of new principles of scientific management. Published 1911. p. 3
1910s, Ads and Sales (1911)

War

“This is a fight for the survival of British mining industry and I am not prepared to accept the imposition of a pensioner from the United States whose mandate is to destroy this industry as he destroyed the British steel industry. I give warning to the board and to the Government that they must now give very serious reconsideration to the policies and the proposals they are trying to implement in pit closures and the reduction in manpower levels. I am convinced that the mineworkers have now reached the point where enough is enough.”

Arthur Scargill (1938) British trade unionist

Speech (2 March 1983), quoted in Ronald Kershaw, "Scargill demands strike solidarity", The Times (3 March 1983), p. 2

Fight

“I totally agree that there is an implementation cost needed to actuate a program. And yes, we need to monitor the implementation of our programs and projects to ensure accountability and judicious use of public funds, but it should not be that expensive. Our government already has an existing machinery and mechanism to precisely do that. We have the Commission on Audit, why do we need this redundancy of functions?”

Francis Escudero (1969) Filipino politician

The Manila Bulletin http://www.mb.com.ph/govt-monitoring-budget-too-much/
2014

“The great question is, to discover not what governments prescribe, but what they ought to prescribe; for no prescription is valid against the conscience of mankind.”

John Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton (1834–1902) British politician and historian

The History of Freedom in Antiquity (1877)

Question

“Outside support has always been a danger for the smooth working of the governments. If the President assertively persuades the parties concerned extending outside support to join the government, then such type of most unfortunate situations could have been avoided. If Rajiv Gandhi’s party had joined this government, this crisis would not have occurred.”

R. Venkataraman (1910–2009) seventh Vice-President of India and the 8th President of India

When Congress Party withdrew outside support to Chandra Shekar who had to resign having lost majority in the House
Source: Commissions and Omissions by Indian Presidents and Their Conflicts with the Prime Ministers Under the Constitution: 1977-2001, p. 170.

Support

“[Fascism] is not a sign-post which would direct us here, for I firmly believe that our long experienced democracy will be able to preserve a parliamentary system of government with whatever modifications may be necessary from both extremes of arbitrary rule.”

Winston S. Churchill (1874–1965) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Speech to the Anti-Socialist and Anti-Communist Union (17 February 1933), quoted in Martin Gilbert, Prophet of Truth: Winston S. Churchill, 1922–1939 (London: Minerva, 1990), p. 457
The 1930s

Democracy

“The only logical attitude that any Objectivist should take toward the present government and constitution is one of uncompromising hostility. And since one does not sanction evil in any capacity, that means that every Objectivist should withdraw his sanction from the political establishment immediately and in every possible way.”

Roy A. Childs, Jr. (1949–1992) American libertarian essayist and critic

“The Contradiction in Objectivism,” 1968

Hostility , Way , Evil

“If there has been any crime, it must be prosecuted. If there has been any property of the United States illegally transferred or leased, it must be recovered…. I propose to employ special counsel of high rank drawn from both political parties to bring such actions for the enforcement of the law. Counsel will be instructed to prosecute these cases in the courts so that if there is any guilt it will be punished; if there is any civil liability it will be enforced; if there is any fraud it will be revealed; and if there are any contracts which are illegal they will be canceled. Every law will be enforced. And every right of the people and the Government will be protected.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

Calvin Coolidge, statement on the Teapot Dome scandal, The New York Times (January 27, 1924), p. 1. Quoted by Senator Edward Martin, address to the Mifflin County Republican Committee, Lewistown, Pennsylvania (January 25, 1952), Congressional Record (January 28, 1952), vol. 98, Appendix, p. A400.
1920s

People , Law , Fraud

“How can there be a religion which has no rigid dogmas demanding belief on pain of eternal damnation, no theological postulates, even no fixed theology, no credo distinguishing it from antagonistic or rival religions? How can there be a religion which has no papal head, no governing ecclesiastic body, no church, chapel or congregational system, no binding religious form of any kind obligatory on all its adherents, no one administration and discipline? For the Hindu priests are mere ceremonial officiants without any ecclesiastical authority or disciplinary powers and the Pundits are mere interpreters of the Shastra, not the lawgivers of the religion or its rulers. How again can Hinduism be called a religion when it admits all beliefs, allowing even a kind of high-reaching atheism and agnosticism and permits all possible spiritual experiences, all kinds of religious adventures? The only thing fixed, rigid, positive, clear is the social law, and even that varies in different castes, regions, communities. The caste rules and not the Church; but even the caste cannot punish a man for his beliefs, ban heterodoxy or prevent his following a new revolutionary doctrine or a new spiritual leader.”

Sri Aurobindo (1872–1950) Indian nationalist, freedom fighter, philosopher, yogi, guru and poet

Indian Spirituality and Life (1919)

Pain , Religion , Law , Communication

“As far as country houses were concerned, the functions of the lower ranks within the hierarchy were now only those of respectful service to their superiors. They lived in the basement, or in subordinate wings to either side of the house. The main rooms were designed as the orderly setting for meetings between gentlemen, lords, and princes, who seldom forgot their rank. But behind the rigid etiquette which regulated their intercourse, continual jockeying for power, position and favours went on. The central government was a rich source of jobs and perquisites, which were distributed either by the king himself, or by his ministers and favourites. The main power of the court aristocracy now lay in its power of patronage; it was constantly being solicited for favours.”

Mark Girouard (1931) British architectural historian

Life in the English Country House: A Social and Architectural History (1978)

Housing , Country

“The hired journalist, I thought, ought to realize that he is partly in the entertainment business and partly in the advertising business – advertising either goods, or a cause, or a government. He just has to make up his mind whom he wants to entertain, and what he wants to advertise.”

Claud Cockburn (1904–1981) Irish journalist

Page 220
A Discord of Trumpets (1956)

Business

“But some governments will be timid in the face of terror. And make no mistake about it: If they do not act, America will.”

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

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

“I had hoped for something much better… [T]he poor in this country have not benefited at all from the ANC. This government spends "like a drunken sailor". Instead of investing in projects to give people jobs, they spend millions buying weapons and private jets, and sending gifts to Haiti.”

Helen Suzman (1917–2009) South African politician

As quoted in "Democracy? It was better under apartheid, says Helen Suzman" https://web.archive.org/web/20120901223952/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1462042/Democracy-It-was-better-under-apartheid-says-Helen-Suzman.html (15 May 2004), by Jane Flanagan, The Telegraph
2000s

People , Hope , Country

“The more abstract the expert Idiocracy gets in defining what is murder-by-Muslim immigrant, the more removed will be their solutions—removed from solutions that are at once achievable and the legitimate purview of limited government.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

"The Manchester Massacre And The Immigration Vexation," http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2017/05/manchester_massacre_and_the_immigration_vexation.html American Thinker, May 25, 2017
2010s, 2017

“There are some things in this establishment that are fundamental… about which I shall deal plainly with you… the government by a single person and a parliament is a fundamental… and… though I may seem to plead for myself, yet I do not: no, nor can any reasonable man say it… I plead for this nation, and all the honest men therein.”

Oliver Cromwell (1599–1658) English military and political leader

To the First Protectorate Parliament (12 September 1654)

Men , Personality

“The public-choice theorists would have us believe that nobody ever gets involved in governments or the political arena out of a desire to accomplish public goals…. Needless to say, the notion that citizens would voluntarily band together to fight injustice and poverty in faraway parts of the world is incomprehensible to this kind of thinking. This perhaps explains the frequent attempt to dismiss those in the anti-globalization movement as nothing more than a group of self-seeking opportunists - as if there is some kind of money to be made in championing debt elimination for the Third World.”

Linda McQuaig (1951) journalist and author

All You Can Eat: Greed, Lust and the New Capitalism (2001)

Money , World , Thinking , Fight

“It must be the duty of the next Labour Government in power to make an immediate challenge to the capitalist system and take the banks and the land into the custody of the people. The time had come to drop all hesitancy and to be bold. If they returned a Socialist Government next time, it was going to "do things," whatever it cost.”

Stafford Cripps (1889–1952) British politician

Speech in Canning Town (26 June 1935), quoted in The Times (28 June 1935), p. 13.

People , Time

“On the imprisonment of Mahomed, Futteh Khan, assuming the reigns of government, and being formally crowned, was acknowledged King of Kashmeer in the year 902; and appointed Suffy and Runga Ray, the two officers who had lately made their escape, his ministers. About this time one Meer Shumsood-Deen, disciple of Shah Kasim Anwur, the son of Syud Mahomed Noorbukhsh arrived in Kashmeer from Irak. Futteh Khan made over to this holy personage all the confiscated lands which had lately fallen to the crown; and his disciples went forth destroying the temples of the idolaters, in which they met with the support of the government, so that no one dared to oppose them. In a short time many of the Kashmeeries, particularly those of the tribe of Chuk, became converts to the Noorbukhsh tenets. The persuasion of this sect was connected with that of the Sheeas; but many proselytes, who had not tasted of the cup of grace, after the death of Meer Shumsood-Deen, reverted to their idols…”

Firishta (1560–1620) Indian historian

Sultãn Fath Shãh of Kashmir (AD 1485-1499 and 1505-1516) Kashmir
Tãrîkh-i-Firishta

Death , Support , Time

“When everything happens at once, wide and fast moving problems simply route around any central authority. Therefore overall governance must arise from the most humble interdependent acts done locally in parallel, and not from a central command.”

Kevin Kelly (1952) American author and editor

Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems and the Economic World (1995)

Problem

“Once you go nuclear at all, you go nuclear for good; and you know it. Here is the parting of the ways, for from this point two opposite conclusions can be drawn. One is that therefore there can never again be serious war of any duration between Western nations, including Russia—in particular, that there can never again be serious war on the Continent of Europe or the waters around it, which an enemy must master in order to threaten Britain. That is the Government's position. The other conclusion, therefore, is that resort is most unlikely to be had to nuclear weapons at all, but that war could nevertheless develop as if they did not exist, except of course that it would be so conducted as to minimise any possibility of misapprehension that the use of nuclear weapons was imminent or had begun. The crucial question is whether there is any stage of a European war at which any nation would choose self-annihiliation in preference to prolonging the struggle. The Secretary of State says, "Yes, the loser or likely loser would almost instantly choose self-annihiliation."”

Enoch Powell (1912–1998) British politician

I say, "No. The probability, though not the certainty, but surely at least the possibility, is that no such point would come, whatever the course of the conflict."
Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1967/mar/06/defence-army-estimates-1967-68-vote-a in the House of Commons (1 March 1967)
1960s

War , Way , Question , Water

“The situation the Lord Mayor holds is the first officer of the first city in the world in point of commerce and riches, and everything that can constitute the magnificence of a city. He is a judicial officer, and a municipal officer too, and from these combined characters there are duties incumbent upon him, which by all the ties that can bind a man to the discharge of duty, he is bound to discharge. It stands at the head of his duties, next after protecting the religion which binds us to God, to govern that civil policy which binds government together, and prevents us from being a state of anarchy and confusion.”

Lloyd Kenyon, 1st Baron Kenyon (1732–1802) British Baron

Eaton's Case (1793)

God , World , Religion

“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

“I see an America where poverty is defeated by opportunity, not enabled by a government check.”

Mitt Romney (1947) American businessman and politician

2012-03-20
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/03/20/mitt_romneys_illinois_victory_speech_113565.html
Mitt Romney's Illinois Victory Speech
RealClearPolitics
2012

“Another portion say that, if a Republican President is elected, they will secede from the confederacy, and organize a separate and independent Confederacy of their own. Whether that constitutes treason or not, is a matter of opinion, and may be a matter of controversy; but it is, nevertheless, equally fatal to the perpetuity of the existing Government and the existing institutions of the country.”

Benjamin Stanton (1809–1872) American politician

Speech (1860)

Country

“The speeches by the Minister and the former Minister were an absolute disgrace in complacency, especially the assumption that market forces will solve the housing problem. If that is so, why is it that there are record numbers of homeless people? Why is it that tonight, as on every night of the year, people will be sleeping under the national theatre, in Covent Garden, around the tube stations in London and alongside the main roads? The Government, in their obsession with market forces and the triumph of the rich over the poor, are creating a hobo society. That is all they are trying to do with their housing policies…They are proposing a return to Rachmanism. They are proposing all the horrors of the Rent Act 1957: nothing but homelessness and exploitation for the unemployed, the poor and the homeless.”

Jeremy Corbyn (1949) British Labour Party politician

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1987/apr/28/housing in the House of Commons (28 April 1987).
1980s

People , Problem , Sleep , Housing

“The dispatch of a naval force and the peremptory outcome that Great Britain tried to impose are clear demonstrations that that country persists in addressing the question with arguments based on force, and that the solution is sought through the simple refusal to recognize Argentinian rights. In view of that unacceptable intention, the Argentine Government could have no other response than the one it has just made by taking action. The Argentinian position can in no way be considered a form of aggression against the present inhabitants of the islands. Their rights and ways of life will be respected with the same generosity with which we respected those peoples we liberated during our independence movement. Yet we will not yield to the intimidatory deployment of the British forces; far from using peaceful diplomatic channels, they have threatened the indiscriminate use of those forces. Our forces will act only to the extent strictly necessary. They will in no way disrupt the life of the islanders. On the contrary, they will protect those institutions and persons who agree to coexist with us, but they will not tolerate any excesses either in the islands or on the mainland. We have a clear appreciation of the stance adopted and it is in defence of this stance that the Argentine nation has risen, the whole nation, spiritually and materially.”

Leopoldo Galtieri (1926–2003) Argentine military dictator

President Galtieri’s address to the nation https://teachwar.wordpress.com/resources/war-justifications-archive/falklandsmalvinas-war-1982/#arg1, 2 April 1982

Life , People , Peace , Way

“The suggestions of the shrewdest Democratic papers have proved unavailing in controlling the votes of the loyal whites and blacks of the south. Their innuendoes have been evaded. The people emphatically decline to dispose of their rights for a mess of pottage. In this particular the Democracy of the North found themselves foiled and their money needless. But with a spirit more demon-like than that of a Nero or a Caligula, there has been concocted another plan, destructive, ay, diabolical in its character, worthy only of hearts without regard for god or man, fit for such deeds as those deserving the name of men would shudder to perform. Is it asked, what are those deeds? Let those who liberally contributed to the supply of arms and ammunition in the late rebellious States answer the question. Soon after the close of the war there had grown up in the south a very widely-spread willingness to comply with the requirements of the law. But as the clemency and magnanimity of the general government became manifest once again did the monster rebellion lift its hydra head in renewed defiance, cruel and cowardly, fearing the light of day, hiding itself under the shadow of the night as more befitting its bloody and accursed work.”

Joseph Hayne Rainey (1832–1887) politician

1871, Speech on the the Ku Klux Klan Bill of 1871 (1 April 1871)

Men , Money , God , War

“My government's aim for Fiji is not to return to where we once were but to journey forward together to a place we have not yet been, a Fiji of lasting peace and harmony, where nobody is left behind or goes without.”

Laisenia Qarase (1941) Prime Minister of Fiji

Speech to Muslims celebrating Mohammed's birthday, 25 April 2005

Peace

“It is commonly agreed that Keynes came up with the idea that public works are the best way to help the economy during a recession.
As a result, Keynesian economists seem to have developed a blind faith in the government in general, and in the system of public works in particular.
I do not share the same faith in the government.
I do not share the same faith in public works.<p”

Xavier Sala-i-Martin (1962) Catalan economist

http://www.columbia.edu/~xs23/keynes/keynes2.htm And this may help explain why.
Xavier Sala-i-Martin, Xavier Sala-i-Martin's Home Page http://www.columbia.edu/~xs23/keynes/keynes1.htm.

Faith , Way , Idea , Help

“It is interesting to note that in nearly all the economics courses it is taught that the income tax is the proper instrument for the regulation of the country’s economy; that private property is not an inalienable right (in fact, there are no inalienable rights); that the economic ills of the country are traceable to the remnants of free enterprise; that the economy of the nation can be sound only when the government manages prices, controls wages, and regulates operations. This was not taught in the colleges before 1913.”

Frank Chodorov (1887–1966) American libertarian thinker

Source: The Income Tax: Root of All Evil (1954), p. 34

Country

“Corporations are properly associated with mercantilism, rather than capitalism. Mercantilism is a system under which government grants special status to one or more company at the expense of its competitors. The British East India Company, for example, possessed an exclusive, royally-granted 'right' to conduct trade between India and China, on the one hand, and the British Empire for more than 250 years.
Private capitalism, by contrast, is a system under which various enterprises compete in the marketplace by offering the highest quality goods and services they can, at the lowest possible prices. Progress occurs as individuals and companies strive to raise quality and lower prices.”

L. Neil Smith (1946) American writer

"Corporations, Mercantilism, and Capitalism," http://www.ncc-1776.org/tle2010/tle576-20100627-02.html 27 June 2010.

“Administrative efficiency is not merely a matter of paper clips, time clocks, and standardized economies of motion. These are but minor gadgets. Real efficiency goes much deeper down. It must be built into the structure of a government just as it is built into a piece of machinery. Fortunately the foundations of effective management in public affairs, no less than in private, are well known. They have emerged universally wherever men have worked together for some common purpose, whether through the state, the church, the private association, or the commercial enterprise. They have been written into constitutions, charters, and articles of incorporation, and exist as habits of work in the daily life of all organized peoples. Stated in simple terms these canons of efficiency require the establishment of a responsible and effective chief executive as the center of energy, direction, and administrative management.”

Louis Brownlow (1879–1963) American mayor

Source: Administrative management in the government of the United States. 1937, p. 2

Life , Men , People , Universe

“I suspect SARS is one of the many, many, many man-made pathogens to purposely lower the human population. That's just what I would suspect. I love my country, I fear my government, okay. There have been all kinds of things produced in the last 50 years in various laboratories - and things like that - that are designed to kill people. Bottom line: I think SARS is probably one of those man-made pathogens, like probably AIDS is the same thing.”

Kent Hovind (1953) American young Earth creationist

7 August 2003
Truth Radio

Love , People , Fear , Thinking

“A lesson from this great novelist: The classical liberal tradition is what made us a free, peaceful and prosperous country. We should cherish it and proudly proclaim the moral high ground when defending this tradition against those who want to impose Big Government upon us.”

Maxime Bernier (1963) Canadian politician

19 September 2016 https://torontosun.com/2016/09/19/bernier-libertarian-to-the-max/wcm/e28e7817-9e4f-4dc7-bb4b-1f038af241db
About

Peace , Country

“If these principles are sound, two conclusions follow. The individual and the local, state, and national political units ought to be permitted to assume their own responsibilities. Any other course in the end will be subversive both of character and liberty. But it is equally clear that they in their turn must meet their obligations. If there is to be a continuation of individual and local self-government and of State sovereignty, the individual and locality must govern themselves and the State must assert its sovereignty. Otherwise these rights and privileges will be confiscated under the all-compelling pressure of public necessity for a better maintenance of order and morality. The whole world has reached a stage in which, if we do not set ourselves right, we may be perfectly sure that an authority will be asserted by others for the purpose of setting us right.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, The Reign of Law (1925)

World

“Soldiers, by an agreement between General Ironhewer and me, the troops of the Army of Kentucky have surrendered. That we are beaten is a self-evident fact, and we cannot hope to resist the bomb that hangs over our head like the sword of Damocles. Richmond is fallen. The cause for which you have so long and manfully struggled, and for which you have braved dangers and made so many sacrifices, is today hopeless. Reason dictates and humanity demands that no more blood be shed here. It is your sad duty, and mine, to lay down our arms and to aid in restoring peace. As your commander, I sincerely hope that every officer and soldier will carry out in good faith all the terms of the surrender. War such as you have passed through naturally engenders feelings of animosity, hatred, and revenge. But in captivity and when you return home a manly, straightforward course of conduct will secure the respect even of your enemies. In bidding you farewell, rest assured that you carry with you my best wishes for your future welfare and happiness. I have never sent you where I was unwilling to go myself, nor would I advise you to a course I felt myself unwilling to pursue. You have been good soldiers. Preserve your honor, and the government to which you have surrendered can afford to me and, I hope, will be magnanimous.”

Harry Turtledove book Settling Accounts: In at the Death

C.S. Army General George S. Patton's final address to the Army of Kentucky in July 1944, p. 339
Settling Accounts: In at the Death (2007)

War , Sadness , Peace , Faith

“Love, work and knowledge are the well-springs of our life. They should also govern it.”

Wilhelm Reich (1897–1957) Austrian-American psychoanalyst

Liebe, Arbeit und Wissen sind die Quellen unseres Lebens. Sie sollen es auch regieren.
His personal motto; the German phrase is found in the preamble of Charakteranalyse (1971 [1933]); the English translation was used at least as early as The Function of the Orgasm (1948), a translation of Die Funktion des Orgasmus (1927).

Love , Life , Spring , Knowledge

“I finally arrived here in 1968 with $20 in my pocket. What a special day it was. I remember I arrived here with empty pockets but full of dreams, full of determination, full of desire. The presidential campaign was in full swing. I remember watching the Nixon-Humphrey presidential race on TV. A friend of mine who spoke German and English translated for me. I heard Humphrey saying things that sounded like socialism, which I had just left. But then I heard Nixon speak. He was talking about free enterprise, getting the government off your back, lowering the taxes and strengthening the military. Listening to Nixon speak sounded more like a breath of fresh air. I said to my friend, I said, 'What party is he?”

Arnold Schwarzenegger (1947) actor, businessman and politician of Austrian-American heritage

My friend said, 'He's a Republican'. I said, 'Then I am a Republican'. And I have been a Republican ever since.
Arrived as immigrant with only $20 in his pocket http://www.ontheissues.org/Celeb/Arnold_Schwarzenegger_Immigration.htm
2000s, Speech at the Republican National Convention (31 August 2004)

Dreams

“How important it is, then, that the child be taught to govern its passions! How important that it be taught to be kind, gentle, loving, and humane; and in all the range of human thought there is not a better, wiser, or more expedient way of accomplishing this end than by teaching kindness towards God's lower creatures. If children are thus taught they will have instilled into their hearts those principles of action which will make them kind and merciful not only to the lower animals, but also toward their fellow-men as they attain to manhood. Let them be taught that the lower animals are God's creatures, as they themselves are, put here by a common Heavenly Father, each for its own special purpose, and that they have the same right to life and protection. Let them be taught that principle recognised by all noble-hearted men, that it is only a depraved, debased, and cowardly nature that will injure an inferior, defenceless creature, simply because it is in its power to do so, and that there is no better, no grander test of true bravery and nobility of character than one's treatment of the lower animals.”

Ralph Waldo Trine (1866–1958) American author

Source: Every Living Creature (1899), pp. 6-7

Love , Life , Men , God

““But then—you’re telling me they brought unrestricted communications with them?” he asked.
“Yup.” Rachel looked up from her console. “We’ve been trying for years to tell your leaders, in the nicest possible way: information wants to be free. But they wouldn’t listen. For forty years we tried. Then along comes the Festival, which treats censorship as a malfunction and routes communications around it. The Festival won’t take no for an answer because it doesn’t have an opinion on anything; it just is.”
“But information isn’t free. It can’t be. I mean, some things — if anyone could read anything they wanted, they might read things that would tend to deprave and corrupt them, wouldn’t they? People might give exactly the same consideration to blasphemous pornography that they pay to the Bible! They could plot against the state, or each other, without the police being able to listen in and stop them!”
Martin sighed. “You’re still hooked on the state thing, aren’t you?” he said. “Can you take it from me, there are other ways of organizing your civilization?”
“Well—” Vassily blinked at him in mild confusion. “Are you telling me you let information circulate freely where you come from?”
“It’s not a matter of permitting it,” Rachel pointed out. “We had to admit that we couldn’t prevent it. Trying to prevent it was worse than the disease itself.”
“But, but lunatics could brew up biological weapons in their kitchens, destroy cities! Anarchists would acquire the power to overthrow the state, and nobody would be able to tell who they were or where they belonged anymore. The most foul nonsense would be spread, and nobody could stop it—” Vassily paused. “You don’t believe me,” he said plaintively.
“Oh, we believe you alright,” Martin said grimly. “It’s just—look, change isn’t always bad. Sometimes freedom of speech provides a release valve for social tensions that would lead to revolution. And at other times, well—what you’re protesting about boils down to a dislike for anything that disturbs the status quo. You see your government as a security blanket, a warm fluffy cover that’ll protect everybody from anything bad all the time. There’s a lot of that kind of thinking in the New Republic; the idea that people who aren’t kept firmly in their place will automatically behave badly. But where I come from, most people have enough common sense to avoid things that’d harm them; and those that don’t, need to be taught. Censorship just drives problems underground.”
“But, terrorists!”
“Yes,” Rachel interrupted, “terrorists. There are always people who think they’re doing the right thing by inflicting misery on their enemies, kid. And you’re perfectly right about brewing up biological weapons and spreading rumors. But—” She shrugged. “We can live with a low background rate of that sort of thing more easily than we can live with total surveillance and total censorship of everyone, all the time.” She looked grim. “If you think a lunatic planting a nuclear weapon in a city is bad, you’ve never seen what happens when a planet pushed the idea of ubiquitous surveillance and censorship to the limit. There are places where—” She shuddered.”

Charles Stross book Singularity Sky

Source: Singularity Sky (2003), Chapter 14, “The Telephone Repairman” (pp. 296-297)

People , Disease , Way , Communication

“When I purchase a food item at the supermarket, I can be confident that the label will state how much riboflavin is in it. The United States government requires this, and for a good reason, which is: I have no idea. I don't even know what riboflavin is. I do know I eat a lot of it. For example, I often start the day with a hearty Kellogg's strawberry Pop-Tart, which has, according to the label, a riboflavin rating of 10 percent. I assume this means that 10 percent of the Pop-Tart is riboflavin. Maybe it's the red stuff in the middle. Anyway, I'm hoping riboflavin is a good thing; if it turns out that it's a bad thing, like "riboflavin" is the Latin word for "cockroach pus," then I am definitely in trouble.”

Dave Barry (1947) American writer

Dave Barry Hits Below the Beltway (2001)

Food , Hope , Confidence , Idea

“No one should be fooled into believing that Saudi Arabia is striving towards a more open and pluralistic form of government. … The very opposite is true, what we are witnessing is a regime that is tightening its grip on the social fabric of society, choking all forms of open debate, suffocating civil society, silencing the voice of reform and imprisoning those who are striving towards modernity.”

Ben Emmerson (1963) British Queen's Counsel

As quoted in Saudi Arabia using anti-terror laws to detain and torture political dissidents, UN says https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/saudi-arabia-torture-political-dissidents-anti-terror-laws-un-mohammad-bin-salman-a8388226.html (8 June 2018), The Independent.

Fools , Silence

“Of all these offenses the one that is most widely, frequently, and vehemently denounced is undoubtedly imperialism—sometimes just Western, sometimes Eastern (that is, Soviet) and Western alike. But the way this term is used in the literature of Islamic fundamentalists often suggests that it may not carry quite the same meaning for them as for its Western critics. In many of these writings the term "imperialist" is given a distinctly religious significance, being used in association, and sometimes interchangeably, with "missionary," and denoting a form of attack that includes the Crusades as well as the modern colonial empires. One also sometimes gets the impression that the offense of imperialism is not—as for Western critics—the domination by one people over another but rather the allocation of roles in this relationship. What is truly evil and unacceptable is the domination of infidels over true believers. For true believers to rule misbelievers is proper and natural, since this provides for the maintenance of the holy law, and gives the misbelievers both the opportunity and the incentive to embrace the true faith. But for misbelievers to rule over true believers is blasphemous and unnatural, since it leads to the corruption of religion and morality in society, and to the flouting or even the abrogation of God's law. This may help us to understand the current troubles in such diverse places as Ethiopian Eritrea, Indian Kashmir, Chinese Sinkiang, and Yugoslav Kossovo, in all of which Muslim populations are ruled by non-Muslim governments. It may also explain why spokesmen for the new Muslim minorities in Western Europe demand for Islam a degree of legal protection which those countries no longer give to Christianity and have never given to Judaism. Nor, of course, did the governments of the countries of origin of these Muslim spokesmen ever accord such protection to religions other than their own. In their perception, there is no contradiction in these attitudes. The true faith, based on God's final revelation, must be protected from insult and abuse; other faiths, being either false or incomplete, have no right to any such protection.”

Bernard Lewis (1916–2018) British-American historian

Books, The Roots of Muslim Rage (1990)

God , People , Faith , Religion

“Those of us who are sympathetic to Kantian ethics usually are so because we regard it as an ethics of autonomy, based on respect for the human capacity to govern our own lives according to rational principles. Kantian ethical theory is grounded on the idea that the moral law is binding on me only because it is regarded as proceeding from my own will.”

Allen W. Wood (1942) academic

Kantian Ethics (2008)

Law , Idea

“I just long for the day I wake up and find that the Saudi royal family are swinging from lampposts and that they've got a proper government that represents the people of Saudi Arabia.”

Ken Livingstone (1945) Mayor of London between 2000 and 2008

As quoted in "New Labour, new Ken? Think again as Mayor speaks" by Joe Murphy in Evening Standard (8 April 2004), p. 19.
Interview with The Guardian (7 April 2004)

People , Family

“Most matters previously subject to state jurisdiction have been pulled into the orbit of the judiciary. So much for Alexander Hamilton's promise, in Federalist No. 78 (May 28, 1788), that the Judiciary would be the weakest of the three branches of his proposed government.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

“Conned About Marriage, Constitution and States’ Rights” http://www.wnd.com/2014/01/conned-about-marriage-constitution-and-states-rights, WorldNetDaily.com, January 23, 2014.
2010s, 2014

“Fanaticism and extremism cannot grow on an earth whose soil is embedded in the spirit of tolerance, moderation, and balance. Good governance can eliminate injustice, destitution and poverty.”

Abdullah of Saudi Arabia (1924–2015) former King of Saudi Arabia

Remarks at a Organisation of Islamic Cooperation Summit http://washingtontimes.com/article/20071010/EDITORIAL/110100007/1013/EDITORIAL 5 December 2005.

“The minimum principle that unified the knowledge of light, gravitation, and electricity of Hamilton's time no longer suffices to relate these fundamental branches of physics. Within fifty years of its creation, the belief that Hamilton's principle would outlive all other physical laws of physics was shattered. Minimum principles have since been created for separate branches of physics… but these are not only restricted… but seem to be contrived…
A single minimum principle, a universal law governing all processes in nature, is still the direction in which the search for simplicity is headed, with the price of simplicity now raised from a mastery of differential equations to a mastery of the calculus of variations.”

Morris Kline (1908–1992) American mathematician

Source: Mathematical Thought from Ancient to Modern Times (1972), p. 442.

Law , Search , Nature , Knowledge

“His writings include works on mechanics, sound, astronomy, the tides, the laws of motion, the Torricellian tube, botany, physiology, music, the calendar (in opposition to the Gregorian reform), geology, and the compass,—a range too wide to allow of the greatest success in any of the lines of his activity. He was also an ingenious cryptologist and assisted the government in deciphering diplomatic messages.”

David Eugene Smith (1860–1944) American mathematician

History of Mathematics (1923) Vol.1

Law , Music , Success

“Major parties have lived more for patronage than for principles; their goal has been to bind together a sufficiently large coalition of diverse interests to get into power; and once in power, to arrange sufficiently satisfactory compromises of interests to remain there. Minor parties have been attached to some special idea or interest, and they have generally expressed their positions through firm and identifiable programs and principles. Their function has not been to win or govern, but to agitate, educate, generate new ideas, and supply the dynamic element in our political life. When a third party's demands become popular enough, they are appropriated by one or both of the major parties and the third party disappears. Third parties are like bees: once they have stung, they die.”

Richard Hofstadter (1916–1970) American historian

Source: The Age of Reform: from Bryan to F.D.R. (1955), Chapter III, part I, p. 97

Life , Education , Idea , Bee

“Legal issues aside, the American people and government should never abide the use of torture by our military or intelligence agencies. A decent society never accepts or justifies torture. It dehumanizes both torturer and victim, yet seldom produces reliable intelligence. Torture by rogue American troops or agents puts all Americans at risk, especially our rank-and-file soldiers stationed in dozens of dangerous places around the globe. God forbid terrorists take American soldiers or travelers hostage and torture them as some kind of sick retaliation for Abu Gharib.”

Ron Paul (1935) American politician and physician

Torture, War, and Presidential Powers, June 15, 2004 http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul185.html
2000s, 2001-2005

God , People , Travel , Intelligence

“The doctrine of laissez-faire in the mid-nineteenth century essentially allowed three functions for the government: first, maintaining the external defense of the country; second, providing for the internal order and security of persons; and third, possibly, providing for minimal public amenities. … Criminalization and punishment became, undisputedly, the most legitimate and competent task of the government. There, for sure, government intervention was proper, necessary, legitimate, and competent. There, natural orderliness had to be replaced by governmental ordering.”

Bernard Harcourt (1963) American academic

Source: The Illusion of Free Markets: Punishment and the Myth of Natural Order (2011), p. 37

Nature , Personality , Country

“Inverted totalitarianism reverses things. It is all politics all of the time but a politics largely untempered by the political. Party squabbles are occasionally on public display, and there is a frantic and continuous politics among factions of the party, interest groups, competing corporate powers, and rival media concerns. And there is, of course, the culminating moment of national elections when the attention of the nation is required to make a choice of personalities rather than a choice between alternatives. What is absent is the political, the commitment to finding where the common good lies amidst the welter of well-financed, highly organized, single-minded interests rabidly seeking governmental favors and overwhelming the practices of representative government and public administration by a sea of cash.”

Sheldon S. Wolin (1922–2015) American political philosopher

Sheldon Wolin, Democracy Incorporated: Managed Democracy and the Specter of Inverted Totalitarianism (2008), p. 66

Time , Personality , Sea

“Right now, because of the byzantine nature of the way that we regulate in this country, if you have a cheese pizza — you make a cheese pizza — that is governed by the United States Department of Agriculture. No, it’s the other way around. I always get these backwards. If you make a cheese pizza, it’s governed by the Food and Drug Administration. If you put a pepperoni on it, that’s governed by the USDA. If you have a chicken, it’s governed by the USDA. If that chicken lays an egg, it’s governed by the FDA. But if you break the egg and make it into an omelet, that is now covered again by the USDA.
If you have open-face roast beef sandwich, that’s one or the other. But you put the bread on top of it, it’s the other one. A hotdog — the hotdog meat is governed by one. You put it in a bun, it’s governed by another. One of my favorites: If you have a saltwater fish — you have a salmon, and it’s in the ocean, it’s governed by the Department of Commerce. Once it swims up river, it’s governed by the Department of Interior. And to get there, it has to go up a fish ladder governed by the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers. This is stupid. This is just — this makes no sense.”

Mick Mulvaney (1967) Director of the Office of Management and Budget

21 June 2018 https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-cabinet-meeting-9/

Stupidity , Food , Way , Nature

“That, although a century out of date, would certainly be a distinctive, different policy. But it would not be a Conservative policy and it would not provide a Conservative alternative. For better or worse the central Government is already responsible, in some way or another, for nearly half the activities of Britain. It is by far the biggest spender and the biggest employer.”

Edward Heath (1916–2005) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1970–1974)

Speech in Scotland (10 September 1968) criticising free market ideas, quoted in The Times (11 September 1968), p. 1.
Leader of the Opposition

Way

“The only means which have been placed in my power of "raising the wages of colliers" has been by endeavouring to beat down all those restrictions upon trade which tend to reduce the price to be obtained for the product of their labour, & to lower as much as may be the taxes on the commodities which they may require for use or for consumption. Beyond this I look to the forethought not yet so widely diffused in this country as in Scotland, & in some foreign lands; & I need not remind you that in order to facilitate its exercise the Government have been empowered by Legislation to become through the Dept. of the P. O. the receivers & guardians of savings.”

William Ewart Gladstone (1809–1898) British Liberal politician and prime minister of the United Kingdom

Letter to Daniel Jones, an unemployed collier who complained of unemployment and of low wages (20 October 1869) as quoted in The Gladstone Diaries: With Cabinet Minutes and Prime-ministerial Correspondence: 1869-June 1871 Vol. 7 (1982) by H. C. G. Matthew, p. lxxiv
1860s

Exercises , Country

“It must be all the same to the citizens ("ressortissants", Fr.) of a country that their governing (those in power) speak such language or such other ("telle langue ou telle autre", Fr.); likewise that it must be all the same to them that these adhere to such or such religion, so long as a full (or complete) liberty is equally garantee for everyone.”

African Spir (1837–1890) Russian philosopher

Source: Words of a Sage : Selected thoughts of African Spir (1937), p. 54.

Religion , Country

“We must always remember that, as Americans, we all have a common enemy -- an enemy that is dangerous, powerful and relentless. I refer, of course, to the federal government.”

Dave Barry (1947) American writer

Washington Post December 19, 2004 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A218-2004Dec14.html (Second Source: A video of Dave Barry reacting to a university response to this quote) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tE3REvTJjXU,
Columns and articles

“Women I know are outraged that Democrats think that women are nothing more than helpless and hopeless creatures whose only goal in life is to have the government provide for them birth control medication. Women I know are smart, educated, intelligent, capable of doing anything that anyone else can do. Our party stands for the recognition of the equality of women and the capacity of women. That's not a war on them, that's a war for them. And if the Democrats want to insult the women of America by making them believe that they are helpless without Uncle Sugar coming in and providing for them a prescription each month for birth control because they cannot control their libido or their reproductive system without the help of government then so be it!”

Mike Huckabee (1955) Arkansas politician

Republican National Committee winter meeting, , quoted in * 2014-01-23
Fox's Huckabee: Democrats Tell Women They Can't Control Their Libidos
Media Matters for America
http://mediamatters.org/blog/2014/01/23/foxs-huckabee-democrats-tell-women-they-cant-co/197717

Life , Women , War , Education

““Organization theory,” a term that appeared in the middle of the twentieth century, has multiple meanings. When it first emerged, the term expressed faith in scientific research as a way to gain understanding of human beings and their interactions. Although scientific research had been occurring for several centuries, the idea that scientific research might enhance understanding of human behavior was considerably newer and rather few people appreciated it. Simon (1950, 1952-3, 1952) was a leading proponent for the creation of “organization theory”, which he imagined as including scientific management, industrial engineering, industrial psychology, the psychology of small groups, human-resources management, and strategy. The term “organization theory” also indicated an aspiration to state generalized, abstract propositions about a category of social systems called “organizations,” which was a very new concept. Before and during the 1800s, people had regarded armies, schools, churches, government agencies, and social clubs as belonging to distinct categories, and they had no name for the union of these categories. During the 1920s, some people began to perceive that diverse kinds of medium-sized social systems might share enough similarities to form a single, unified category. They adopted the term “organization” for this unified category.”

William H. Starbuck (1934) American academic

William H. Starbuck and Philippe Baumard (2009). "The seeds, blossoming, and scant yield of organization theory," in: Jacques Rojot et. al (eds.) Comportement organisationnel - Volume 3 De Boeck Supérieur. p. 15

People , School , Faith , Way

“Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades. In this revolution, research has become central, it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.
Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers. The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present — and is gravely to be regarded.
Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.”

Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890–1969) American general and politician, 34th president of the United States (in office from 1953 to 1961)

1960s, Farewell address (1961)

Money , Idea , Fashion , Universe

“Our program is simple: we wish to govern Italy. They ask us for programs but there are already too many. It is not programs that are wanting for the salvation of Italy but men and will power.”

Benito Mussolini (1883–1945) Duce and President of the Council of Ministers of Italy. Leader of the National Fascist Party and subsequen…

Speech at Udine (September 20, 1922) "The Question of Regime. The Monarchy and Fascism," quoted in A History of Civilization (1955) by Crane Brinton, John B. Christopher, and Robert Lee Wolff, p. 520
1920s

Men

“No trace is to be found in the Constitution of an intention to create a dependence of the Government of the Union on those of the States, for the execution of the great powers assigned to it. Its means are adequate to its ends, and on those means alone was it expected to rely for the accomplishment of its ends. To impose on it the necessity of resorting to means which it cannot control, which another Government may furnish or withhold, would render its course precarious, the result of its measures uncertain, and create a dependence on other Governments which might disappoint its most important designs, and is incompatible with the language of the Constitution.”

John Marshall (1755–1835) fourth Chief Justice of the United States

17 U.S. (4 Wheaton) 316, 424
McCulloch v. Maryland (1819)
Context: [.. ] it can scarcely be necessary to say that the existence of State banks can have no possible influence on the question. No trace is to be found in the Constitution of an intention to create a dependence of the Government of the Union on those of the States, for the execution of the great powers assigned to it. Its means are adequate to its ends, and on those means alone was it expected to rely for the accomplishment of its ends. To impose on it the necessity of resorting to means which it cannot control, which another Government may furnish or withhold, would render its course precarious, the result of its measures uncertain, and create a dependence on other Governments which might disappoint its most important designs, and is incompatible with the language of the Constitution. But were it otherwise, the choice of means implies a right to choose a national bank in preference to State banks, and Congress alone can make the election. After the most deliberate consideration, it is the unanimous and decided opinion of this Court that the act to incorporate the Bank of the United States is a law made in pursuance of the Constitution, and is a part of the supreme law of the land.

Disappointment , Dependency