Quotes about mass
page 15

James Bovard photo

“Instead of revealing the “will of the people,” election results are often only a one-day snapshot of transient mass delusions.”

James Bovard (1956) American journalist

From Attention Deficit Democracy (Palgrave, 2006) http://www.jimbovard.com/Epigrams%20Attention%20Deficit%20Democracy.htm

Eric Hobsbawm photo

“Xenophobia looks like becoming the mass ideology of the 20th-century fin-de-siecle.”

Eric Hobsbawm (1917–2012) British academic historian and Marxist historiographer

Divided Europeans: Understanding Ethnicities in Conflict http://books.google.co.in/books?id=4aECmbMMzIYC&pg=PA41 (1999), p. 41.

Victor Villaseñor photo

“Liberal education is the ladder by which we try to ascend from mass democracy to democracy as originally meant.”

Leo Strauss (1899–1973) Classical philosophy specialist and father of neoconservativism

“What is liberal education,” pp. 4-5
Liberalism Ancient and Modern (1968)
Context: It was once said that democracy is the regime that stands or falls by virtue: a democracy is a regime in which all or most adults are men of virtue, and since virtue seems to require wisdom, a regime in which all or most adults are virtuous and wise, or the society in which all or most adults have developed their reason to a high degree, or the rational society. Democracy, in a word, is meant to be an aristocracy which has broadened into a universal aristocracy. … There exists a whole science—the science which I among thousands of others profess to teach, political science—which so to speak has no other theme than the contrast between the original conception of democracy, or what one may call the ideal of democracy, and democracy as it is. … Liberal education is the ladder by which we try to ascend from mass democracy to democracy as originally meant.

Elie Wiesel photo
Richard Rodríguez photo
Taliesin photo
Vladimir Lenin photo

“We have the following of the majority of a class, the vanguard of the revolution, the vanguard of the people, which is capable of carrying the masses with it.”

Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) Russian politician, led the October Revolution

Collected Works, Vol. 26, pp. 22–27.
Collected Works

Sarah Schulman photo
William Cobbett photo

“…the existence of a 'system' that was ruining the country. The system of upstarts; of low-bred, low-minded sycophants usurping the stations designed by nature, by reason, by the Constitution, and by the interests of the people, to men of high birth, eminent talents, or great national services; the system by which the ancient Aristocracy and the Church have been undermined; by which the ancient gentry of the kingdom have been almost extinguished, their means of support having been transferred, by the hand of the tax gatherer, to contractors, jobbers and Jews; the system by which but too many of the higher orders have been rendered the servile dependents of the minister of the day, and by which the lower, their generous spirit first broken down, have been moulded into a mass of parish fed paupers. Unless it be the intention, the solemn resolution, to change this system, let no one talk to me of a change of ministry; for, until this system be destroyed…until the filthy tribe of jobbers, brokers and peculators shall be swept from the councils of the nation and the society of her statesmen…there is no change of men, that can, for a single hour, retard the mighty mischief that we dread.”

William Cobbett (1763–1835) English pamphleteer, farmer and journalist

Political Register (20 April 1805), quoted in Karl W. Schweizer and John W. Osborne, Cobbett and His Times (Leicester: Leicester University Press, 1990), pp. 27-28, 71-72.

David Mamet photo
Ellen Willis photo
Martin Luther King, Jr. photo
Vanna Bonta photo

“The view from space is described as life-changing…seeing Earth, our home planet, the jewel it is, a mass, a rock suspended in its neighborhood, our neighborhood, the universe.”

Vanna Bonta (1958–2014) Italian-American writer, poet, inventor, actress, voice artist (1958-2014)

Vanna Bonta Talks Sex in Space (Interview - Femail magazine)

Heinrich Heine photo

“If one has no heart, one cannot write for the masses.”

Heinrich Heine (1797–1856) German poet, journalist, essayist, and literary critic

Letter to Julius Campe (March 18, 1840)

Kage Baker photo
Chris Quigg photo
Simon Hoggart photo
John Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton photo

“The government of the Israelites was a Federation, held together by no political authority, but by the unity of… faith and founded not on physical force but on a voluntary covenant. The principle of self-government was carried out not only in each tribe, but in every group of at least 120 families; and there was neither privilege of rank nor inequality before the law. Monarchy was so alien to the primitive spirit of the community that it was resisted by Samuel… The throne was erected on a compact; and the king was deprived of the right of legislation among a people that recognised no lawgiver but God, whose highest aim in politics was to… make its government conform to the ideal type that was hallowed by the sanctions of heaven. The inspired men who rose in unfailing succession to prophesy against the usurper and the tyrant, constantly proclaimed that the laws, which were divine, were paramount over sinful rulers, and appealed… to the healing forces that slept in the uncorrupted consciences of the masses. Thus the… Hebrew nation laid down the parallel lines on which all freedom has been won—the doctrine of national tradition and the doctrine of the higher law; the principle that a constitution grows from a root, by process of development… and the principle that all political authorities must be tested and reformed according to a code which was not made by man. The operation of these principles… occupies the whole of the space we are going over together.”

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

Source: The History of Freedom in Antiquity (1877)

Arthur Green photo
Osama bin Laden photo

“The events that affected my soul in a direct way started in 1982 when America permitted the Israelis to invade Lebanon and the American Sixth Fleet helped them in that. This bombardment began and many were killed and injured and others were terrorised and displaced.
I couldn't forget those moving scenes, blood and severed limbs, women and children sprawled everywhere. Houses destroyed along with their occupants and high rises demolished over their residents, rockets raining down on our home without mercy. The situation was like a crocodile meeting a helpless child, powerless except for his screams. Does the crocodile understand a conversation that doesn't include a weapon? And the whole world saw and heard but it didn't respond. In those difficult moments many hard-to-describe ideas bubbled in my soul, but in the end they produced an intense feeling of rejection of tyranny, and gave birth to a strong resolve to punish the oppressors. And as I looked at those demolished towers in Lebanon, it entered my mind that we should punish the oppressor in kind and that we should destroy towers in America in order that they taste some of what we tasted and so that they be deterred from killing our women and children.
And that day, it was confirmed to me that oppression and the intentional killing of innocent women and children is a deliberate American policy. Destruction is freedom and democracy, while resistance is terrorism and intolerance.
This means the oppressing and embargoing to death of millions as Bush Sr did in Iraq in the greatest mass slaughter of children mankind has ever known, and it means the throwing of millions of pounds of bombs and explosives at millions of children - also in Iraq - as Bush Jr did, in order to remove an old agent and replace him with a new puppet to assist in the pilfering of Iraq's oil and other outrages.
So with these images and their like as their background, the events of September 11th came as a reply to those great wrongs, should a man be blamed for defending his sanctuary?”

Osama bin Laden (1957–2011) founder of al-Qaeda

Full transcript of bin Ladin's speech http://www.aljazeera.com/archive/2004/11/200849163336457223.html Aljazeera, (01 Nov 2004)
2000s, 2004

“To fix the fluctuating mass of theories, no man has suggested any other expedient than the construction of some new theory, to whose authority… all persons shall submit. The remedy is constantly augmenting the disease.”

Alexander Bryan Johnson (1786–1867) United States philosopher and banker

Lecture I. §4.
A Treatise on Language: Or, The Relation which Words Bear to Things, in Four Parts (1836)

“Most people in the West, certainly everyone in Israel, would agree that the Palestinian suicide bombers, who kill women and children, are terrorists. Not many people remember when Palestine, as the land of Israel was once called, was in that obscure state, a British Protectorate. Were the Jewish members of the Stern Gang, those who hanged a British sergeant with piano wire or organized the bomb in the King David Hotel with murderous results (the organization in which Prime Minister Begin started his political career), ‘freedom fighters’ or ‘terrorists’? What, looking at the matter from an entirely neutral standpoint, would we call them now?
A terrorist, the dictionary tells us, is ‘one who favours or uses terror-inspiring methods of governing or of coercing government or community’. This would certainly cover Russian activities in Chechnya and Israeli invasions into Palestinian territory, killing innocent men, women and children and even employees of the United Nations, in a prolonged attempt to fight ruthless terrorism with ruthless terrorism. The word ‘terrorist’ could certainly have been applied to Nelson Mandela before his trial. If it means the calculated mass killing of civilians to obtain an end, it must be applied to the destruction of Hamburg and Düsseldorf and, of course, to the dropping of H-bombs. So all these activities can be defined as ‘terrorism’ if they are committed by an enemy or ‘freedom-fighting’ if by a friend. If so, the conception of a ‘war’ against it calls for the most careful thought.”

John Mortimer (1923–2009) English barrister, dramatist, screenwriter and author

Source: Where There's a Will: Thoughts on the Good Life (2003), Ch. 15 : Interesting Times

Geert Wilders photo
Radhanath Swami photo
Eduardo Torroja photo
Will Eisner photo
Mao Zedong photo

“The revolutionary war is a war of the masses; it can be waged only by mobilizing the masses and relying on them.”

Mao Zedong (1893–1976) Chairman of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China

Gémìng zhànzhēng shì qúnzhòng de zhànzhēng, zhǐyǒu dòngyuán qúnzhòng cáinéng jìnxíng zhànzhēng, zhǐyǒu yīkào qúnzhòng cáinéng jìnxíng zhànzhēng.
Chapter 8 https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/works/red-book/ch08.htm, originally published in Be Concerned with the Well-Being of the Masses, Pay Attention to Methods of Work (January 27, 1934), Selected Works, Vol. I. p. 147.
Quotations from Chairman Mao Zedong (The Little Red Book)

Nigel Lawson photo
Luciano Pavarotti photo
Heather Brooke photo
Isaac Asimov photo

“Science Digest asked me to see the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind and write an article for them on the science it contained. I saw the picture and was appalled. I remained appalled even after a doctor’s examination had assured me that no internal organs had been shaken loose by its ridiculous soundwaves. (If you can’t be good, be loud, some say, and Close Encounters was very loud.) … Hollywood must deal with large audiences, most of whom are utterly unfamiliar with good science fiction. It has to bend to them, meet them at least half-way. Fully appreciating that, I could enjoy Planet of the Apes and Star Wars. Star Wars was entertainment for the masses and did not try to be anything more. Leave your sophistication at the door, get into the spirit, and you can have a fun ride. … Seeing a rotten picture for the special effects is like eating a tough steak for the smothered onions, or reading a bad book for the dirty parts. Optical wizardry is something a movie can do that a book can’t but it is no substitute for a story, for logic, for meaning. It is ornamentation, not substance. In fact, whenever a science fiction picture is praised overeffusively for its special effects, I know it’s a bad picture. Is that all they can find to talk about?”

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

"Editorial: The Reluctant Critic", in Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, Vol. 2, Issue 6, (12 November 1978) https://archive.org/stream/Asimovs_v02n06_1978-11-12/<!-- Asimovs_v02n06_1978-11-12_djvu.txt -->
General sources

Michael Polanyi photo
José Ortega Y Gasset photo
George W. Bush photo

“I faced a lot of criticism as president. I didn't like hearing people claim I had lied about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction or cut taxes to benefit the rich. But the suggestion that I was a racist because of the response to Katrina represented an all-time low. I told Laura at the time that it was the worst moment of my presidency. I feel the same way today.”

pp. 325, Chapter 10: Katrina https://books.google.com/books?id=iUJTvsUGWOcC&printsec=frontcover&dq=decision+points&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CBwQ6AEwAGoVChMImu6s8_WEyAIVjNkeCh1oFgyY#v=onepage&q=kanye&f=false
2010s, 2010, Decision Points (November 2010)

Paul Mason (journalist) photo
Leopold Stokowski photo

“Whenever you put your faith in big government for any reason, sooner or later you wind up an apologist for mass murder.”

Karl Hess (1923–1994) American journalist

As quoted in Why Americans Hate Politics, by E.J. Dionne, Jr., Simon & Schuster (2004) p. 267.

Tony Blair photo
Howard Zinn photo
Lavrentiy Beria photo
Bill Hybels photo
George W. Bush photo

“I wasn't happy when we found out there wasn't weapons [of mass destruction in Iraq]</s”

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

2nd Presidential Debate, October 8, 2004
2000s, 2004

George Carlin photo

“I am a Bad American is another mass-forwarded internet message often attributed to George Carlin, but was not written by him.”

George Carlin (1937–2008) American stand-up comedian

"Bogus Carlin email", GeorgeCarlin.com (official website, 2012-09-09 http://georgecarlin.com/home/bogus.html,
Misattributed

Jeremy Rifkin photo
Bernard Membe photo

“It will be none of this summit's business to choose the titles for leaders, it is the business of this summit to see what we are going to do for the suffering people and masses in Africa.”

Bernard Membe (1953) Tanzanian politician

When asked if he would address Robert Mugabe as president; quoted in "Africa urged to act on Zimbabwe," http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7480584.stm BBC News (2008-06-30)

Sergey Nechayev photo

“. The central theme of contemporary autonomist Marxism is a shift from giant organizations and insurrectional seizure to gradualism and Exodus. The rapid transformation of the working class, the blurring of the lines between work and the rest of life, and the shift in meeting a growing share of our needs into the informal and social economy, mean that the Old Left’s workerism (and like Harry Cleaver, I include syndicalism and council communism in the Old Left), its focus on the production process as the center of society, and its treatment of the industrial proletariat as the subject of history, have become obsolete. In this regard, read Toni Negri’s contrast of the Multitude to previous Old Left ideas of the proletariat. Mostly, I call it a heroic fantasy because any model that envisions a post-capitalist transition based on the universal adoption of any monolithic, schematized social model is as ridiculous as Socrates and Glaucon discussing what musical instruments and poetic metres will be permitted in the perfect state. The real world version of the post-capitalist transition — just as with the transition to capitalism five centuries earlier — isn’t a matter of any single cohesive social class, as the subject of history, systematically remaking the world guided by some single, comprehensive ideology, and organized around a uniform institutional model. It’s a matter of a wide variety of prefigurative institutions and technological building blocks that already exist in the present society, continuing to grow and coalesce together until they reach sufficient critical mass for a phase transition — a phase transition whose outlines can only be guessed at in the most general terms. This is the model advocated by Michel Bauwens, by Paul Mason, by John Holloway, by Peter Frase, and by a lot of other people who can hardly be fitted into any American individualist ghetto.”

Kevin Carson (1963) American academic

'In Which the Anarcho-Syndicalists Discover C4SS' (2016)
Other Writing

George Will photo
Rory Bremner photo
David Icke photo
Al Alvarez photo
Swami Vivekananda photo
W. Edwards Deming photo
Henry Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston photo
Albert Jay Nock photo
Bernhard Riemann photo
Rush Limbaugh photo

“I prefer to call the most obnoxious feminists what they really are: feminazis. Tom Hazlett, a good friend who is an esteemed and highly regarded professor of economics at the University of California at Davis, coined the term to describe any female who is intolerant of any point of view that challenges militant feminism. I often use it to describe women who are obsessed with perpetuating a modern-day holocaust: abortion. There are 1.5 million abortions a year, and some feminists almost seem to celebrate that figure. There are not many of them, but they deserve to be called feminazis.A feminazi is a woman to whom the most important thing in life is seeing to it that as many abortions as possible are performed. Their unspoken reasoning is quite simple. Abortion is the single greatest avenue for militant women to exercise their quest for power and advance their belief that men aren't necessary. They don't need men in order to be happy. They certainly don't want males to be able to exercise any control over them. Abortion is the ultimate symbol of women's emancipation from the power and influence of men. With men being precluded from the ultimate decision-making process regarding the future of life in the womb, they are reduced to their proper, inferior role. Nothing matters but me, says the feminazi. My concerns prevail over all else. The fetus doesn't matter, it's an unviable tissue mass.”

Rush Limbaugh (1951) U.S. radio talk show host, Commentator, author, and television personality

[The Way Things Ought to Be, Pocket Books, October 1992, 193, 978-0671751456, 92028659, 26397008, 1724938M]

Adolf Hitler photo

“The great masses of people will more easily fall victims to a big lie than to a small one. Especially if it is repeated again and again.”

Adolf Hitler (1889–1945) Führer and Reich Chancellor of Germany, Leader of the Nazi Party

This misquote could possibly have two possible sources: an abridged version of a paragraph in Mein Kampf regarding the Big Lie, or a report by the United States Office of Strategic Services about Hitler's psychological profile http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/people/h/hitler-adolf/oss-papers/text/oss-profile-03-02.html. The second version is very close to an actual quote by Joseph Goebbels.
Misattributed
Variant: The bigger/more blatant a lie, the more people will believe it.

James Fenimore Cooper photo

“For a time our efforts seem to create, and to adorn, and to perfect, until we forget our origin and destination, substituting self for that divine hand which alone can unite the elements of worlds as they float in gasses, equally from His mysterious laboratory, and scatter them again into thin air when the works of His hand cease to find favour in His view.
Let those who would substitute the voice of the created for that of the Creator, who shout "the people, the people," instead of hymning the praises of their God, who vainly imagine that the masses are sufficient for all things, remember their insignificance and tremble. They are but mites amid millions of other mites, that the goodness of providence has produced for its own wise ends; their boasted countries, with their vaunted climates and productions, have temporary possessions of but small portions of a globe that floats, a point, in space, following the course pointed out by an invisible finger, and which will one day be suddenly struck out of its orbit, as it was originally put there, by the hand that made it. Let that dread Being, then, be never made to act a second part in human affairs, or the rebellious vanity of our race imagine that either numbers, or capacity, or success, or power in arms, is aught more than a short-lived gift of His beneficence, to be resumed when His purposes are accomplished.”

James Fenimore Cooper (1789–1851) American author

The Crater; or, Vulcan's Peak: A Tale of the Pacific http://www.gutenberg.org/files/11573/11573-h/11573-h.htm (1847), Ch. XXX

Irvine Welsh photo

“From its inception, the fascist arrangement has attempted to create the illusion of a mass society in which the traditional capitalist ruling class would continue to play its leading role.”

George Jackson (activist) (1941–1971) activist, Marxist, author, member of the Black Panther Party, and co-founder of the Black Guerrilla Family

Source: Blood in My Eye (1971), p. 121

Lewis Mumford photo
Aneurin Bevan photo
Hermann Rauschning photo
Northrop Frye photo
Ilana Mercer photo

“Donald Trump has buried George W. Bush, for good. Or so we hope. This might not be 'Morning in America,' but it is a moral victory for values in America. Somewhere in those Judeo-Christian values touted by 'values voters' is an injunction against mass murder.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

"Trump called Bush a liar & he won South Carolina (Nevada, too)," http://www.unz.com/imercer/trump-called-bush-a-liar-he-won-south-carolina-nevada-too/ The Unz Review, February 27, 2016.
2010s, 2016

Ibn Battuta photo

“One day I rode in company with ‘Alã-ul-mulk and arrived at a plain called Tarna at a distance of seven miles from the city. There I saw innumerable stone images and animals, many of which had undergone a change, the original shape being obliterated. Some were reduced to a head, others to a foot and so on. Some of the stones were shaped like grain, wheat, peas, beans and lentils. And there were traces of a house which contained a chamber built of hewn stone, the whole of which looked like one solid mass. Upon it was a statue in the form of a man, the only difference being that its head was long, its mouth was towards a side of its face and its hands at its back like a captive’s. There were pools of water from which an extremely bad smell came. Some of the walls bore Hindî inscriptions. ‘Alã-ul-mulk told me that the historians assume that on this site there was a big city, most of the inhabitants of which were notorious. They were changed into stone. The petrified human form on the platform in the house mentioned above was that of their king. The house still goes by the name of ‘the king’s house’. It is presumed that the Hindî inscriptions, which some of the walls bear, give the history of the destruction of the inhabitants of this city. The destruction took place about a thousand years ago…”

Ibn Battuta (1304–1377) Moroccan explorer

Lahari Bandar (Sindh) . The Rehalã of Ibn Battûta translated into English by Mahdi Hussain, Baroda, 1967, p. 10.
Travels in Asia and Africa (Rehalã of Ibn Battûta)

Steve Sailer photo

“As the empirical case for mass immigration has become less plausible, its advocates have increasingly switched to emphasizing their moral superiority: they don`t look out for the general welfare of their fellow citizens, so that makes them better than their fellow citizens.”

Steve Sailer (1958) American journalist and movie critic

Byron Roth`s The Perils Of Diversity: Apologies To The Grandchildren http://www.vdare.com/articles/byron-roths-the-perils-of-diversity-apologies-to-the-grandchildren, VDARE, February 13, 2011

E. M. S. Namboodiripad photo
David Livingstone photo

“The islands above the falls are covered with foliage as beautiful as can be seen anywhere. Viewed from the mass of rock which overhangs the fall, the scenery was the loveliest I had seen.”

David Livingstone (1813–1873) Scottish explorer and missionary

Exploring Magnificent Waterfalls http://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/102004126?q=livingstone&p=par

George W. Bush photo
Herbert Marcuse photo

“In the most advanced areas of this civilization, the social controls have been introjected to the point where even individual protest is affected at its roots. The intellectual and emotional refusal “to go along” appears neurotic and impotent. This is the socio-psychological aspect of the political event that marks the contemporary period: the passing of the historical forces which, at the preceding stage of industrial society, seemed to represent the possibility of new forms of existence. But the term “introjection” perhaps no longer describes the way in which the individual by himself reproduces and perpetuates the external controls exercised by his society. Introjection suggests a variety of relatively spontaneous processes by which a Self (Ego) transposes the “outer” into the “inner.” Thus introjection implies the existence of an inner dimension distinguished from and even antagonistic to the external exigencies—an individual consciousness and an individual unconscious apart from public opinion and behavior. The idea of “inner freedom” here has its reality: it designates the private space in which man may become and remain “himself.” Today this private space has been invaded and whittled down by technological reality. Mass production and mass distribution claim the entire individual, and industrial psychology has long since ceased to be confined to the factory. The manifold processes of introjection seem to be ossified in almost mechanical reactions. The result is, not adjustment but mimesis: an immediate identification of the individual with his society and, through it, with the society as a whole. This immediate, automatic identification (which may have been characteristic of primitive forms of association) reappears in high industrial civilization; its new “immediacy,” however, is the product of a sophisticated, scientific management and organization. In this process, the “inner” dimension of the mind in which opposition to the status quo can take root is whittled down. The loss of this dimension, in which the power of negative thinking—the critical power of Reason—is at home, is the ideological counterpart to the very material process in which advanced industrial society silences and reconciles the opposition. The impact of progress turns Reason into submission to the facts of life, and to the dynamic capability of producing more and bigger facts of the same sort of life. The efficiency of the system blunts the individuals' recognition that it contains no facts which do not communicate the repressive power of the whole. If the individuals find themselves in the things which shape their life, they do so, not by giving, but by accepting the law of things—not the law of physics but the law of their society.”

Source: One-Dimensional Man (1964), pp. 9-11

Wen Jiabao photo

“Only when the masses are reassured, can the country be at peace. Only when the country is at peace, can the leaders be relieved.”

Wen Jiabao (1942) former Premier of the People's Republic of China

Wen Jiabao (2008) cited in: " Sorry seems to be the newest word http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/7234848.stm" at BBC News, 9 February 2008

Clement Attlee photo
Paul Lazarsfeld photo
Erik Naggum photo
José Rizal photo
Louis Althusser photo
Tejinder Virdee photo
Lloyd Kenyon, 1st Baron Kenyon photo
Gideon Levy photo
Konrad Heiden photo
John Fante photo
Heath Ledger photo

“I sat around in a hotel room in London for about a month, locked myself away, formed a little diary and experimented with voices — it was important to try to find a somewhat iconic voice and laugh. I ended up landing more in the realm of a psychopath — someone with very little to no conscience towards his acts … just an absolute sociopath, a cold-blooded, mass-murdering clown …. [being given] free rein [by director Christopher Nolan was] fun, because there are no real boundaries to what The Joker would say or do. Nothing intimidates him, and everything is a big joke.”

Heath Ledger (1979–2008) Australian actor

Interview remarks published in Empire, from interviews conducted in November 2007.
[Dan Jolin, Fear Has a Face, http://www.empireonline.com/magazine/covers/image.asp?id=24227&gallery=1365&caption=%23223%20%28January%202008%29, Empire, 223, January, 2008, 87–88, Bauer Verlagsgruppe, 2008-07-08]
[Dan Jolin, The Dark Knight, http://www.empireonline.com/magazine/covers/image.asp?id=27819&gallery=1365&caption=%23229+%28July+2008%29, Empire, 229, July, 2008, 92–100, Bauer Verlagsgruppe, 2008-08-18]
[Olly Richards, World Exclusive: The Joker Speaks: He's a Cold-blooded Mass-murdering Clown, http://www.empireonline.com/news/story.asp?nid=21560, Empire, Web, Bauer Verlagsgruppe, November 28, 2007, 2008-08-18]

Attila photo

“Here you stand, after conquering mighty nations and subduing the world. I therefore think it foolish for me to goad you with words, as though you were men who had not been proved in action. Let a new leader or an untried army resort to that. It is not right for me to say anything common, nor ought you to listen. For what is war but your usual custom? Or what is sweeter for a brave man than to seek revenge with his own hand? It is a right of nature to glut the soul with vengeance. Let us then attack the foe eagerly; for they are ever the bolder who make the attack. Despise this union of discordant races! To defend oneself by alliance is proof of cowardice. See, even before our attack they are smitten with terror. They seek the heights, they seize the hills and, repenting too late, clamor for protection against battle in the open fields. You know how slight a matter the Roman attack is. While they are still gathering in order and forming in one line with locked shields, they are checked, I will not say by the first wound, but even by the dust of battle. Then on to the fray with stout hearts, as is your wont. Despise their battle line. Attack the Alani, smite the Visigoths! Seek swift victory in that spot where the battle rages. For when the sinews are cut the limbs soon relax, nor can a body stand when you have taken away the bones. Let your courage rise and your own fury burst forth! Now show your cunning, Huns, now your deeds of arms! Let the wounded exact in return the death of his foe; let the unwounded revel in slaughter of the enemy. No spear shall harm those who are sure to live; and those who are sure to die Fate overtakes even in peace. And finally, why should Fortune have made the Huns victorious over so many nations, unless it were to prepare them for the joy of this conflict. Who was it revealed to our sires the path through the Maeotian swamp, for so many ages a closed secret? Who, moreover, made armed men yield to you, when you were as yet unarmed? Even a mass of federated nations could not endure the sight of the Huns. I am not deceived in the issue;--here is the field so many victories have promised us. I shall hurl the first spear at the foe. If any can stand at rest while Attila fights, he is a dead man.”

Attila (406–453) King of the Hunnic Empire

As quoted by Jordanes, The Origin and Deeds of the Goths http://people.ucalgary.ca/~vandersp/Courses/texts/jordgeti.html#attila, translated by Charles C. Mierow

George W. Bush photo

“See, free nations are peaceful nations. Free nations don't attack each other. Free nations don't develop weapons of mass destruction.”

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

Midwest Airlines Center, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, October 3, 2003 http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2003/10/20031003-4.html
2000s, 2003

Vandana Shiva photo
Patrick Buchanan photo
Thomas Jefferson photo

“The question therefore now comes forward, To what other objects shall these surpluses be appropriated, and the whole surplus of impost, after the entire discharge of the public debt, and during those intervals when the purposes of war shall not call for them? Shall we suppress the impost and give that advantage to foreign over domestic manufactures? On a few articles of more general and necessary use the suppression in due season will doubtless be right, but the great mass of the articles on which impost is paid are foreign luxuries, purchased by those only who are rich enough to afford themselves the use of them.
Their patriotism would certainly prefer its continuance and application to the great purposes of the public education, roads, rivers, canals, and such other objects of public improvement as it may be thought proper to add to the constitutional enumeration of Federal powers. By these operations new channels of communications will be opened between the States, the lines of separation will disappear, their interests will be identified, and their union cemented by new and indissoluble ties. Education is here placed among the articles of public care, not that it would be proposed to take its ordinary branches out of the hands of private enterprise, which manages so much better all the concerns to which it is equal, but a public institution can alone supply those sciences which though rarely called for are yet necessary to complete the circle, all the parts of which contribute to the improvement of the country and some of them to its preservation.”

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

Thomas Jefferson's Sixth State of the Union Address (2 December 1806). Advising the origination of an annual fund to be spent through new constitutional powers (by new amendments) from projected surplus revenue.
1800s, Second Presidential Administration (1805-1809)

Albert Einstein photo

“The mass of a body is a measure of its energy content.”

Ist die Trägheit eines Körpers von seinem Energieinhalt abhängig? ("Does the inertia of a body depend upon its energy content?")
Annalen der Physik 18, 639-641 (1905). Quoted in Concepts of Mass in Classical and Modern Physics by Max Jammer (1961), p. 177 http://books.google.com/books?id=lYvz0_8aGsMC&lpg=PP1&pg=PA177#v=onepage&q&f=false
1900s