Quotes about news
page 75

Koenraad Elst photo

“Distortive or even totally false reporting on communally sensitive issues is a well-entrenched feature of Indian journalism. There is no self-corrective mechanism in place to remedy this endemic culture of disinformation. No reporter or columnist or editor ever gets fired or formally reprimanded or even just criticized by his peers for smearing Hindus. This way, a partisan economy with the truth has become a habit hard to relinquish. And foreign correspondents used to trusting their Indian secularist sources have likewise developed a habit of swallowing and relaying highly distorted news stories. Usually, the creation of a false impression of the Indian communal situation is achieved without outright lies, relying rather on the silent treatment for inconvenient facts and a screaming overemphasis on convenient ones. (…) So, moral of the story: feel free to write lies about the Hindus. Even if you are found out, most of the public will never hear of it, and you will not be made to bear any consequences.(…) These days, noisy secularists lie in waiting for communal riots and elatedly jump at them when and where they erupt. They exploit the anti-Hindu propaganda value of riots to the hilt, making up fictional stories as they go along to compensate for any defects in the true account. John Dayal is welcomed to Congressional committees in Washington DC as a crown witness to canards such as how Hindus are raping Catholic nuns in Jhabua, an allegation long refuted in a report by the Congress state government of Madhya Pradesh and more recently in the court verdict on the matter. Arundhati Roy goes lyrical about the torture of a Muslim politician's two daughters by Hindus during the Gujarat riots of 2002, even when the man had only one daughter, who came forward to clarify that she happened to be in the US at the time of the “facts.””

Koenraad Elst (1959) orientalist, writer

Harsh Mander has already been condemned by the Press Council of India for spreading false rumours about alleged Hindu atrocities in his famous column Hindustan Hamara. Teesta Setalwad has reportedly pressured eyewitnesses to give the desired incriminating testimony against Hindus in the Gujarat riots.
K. Elst: Religious Cleansing of Hindus, 2004, Agni conference in The Hague, in The Problem with Secularism (2007)
2000s, The Problem with Secularism (2007)

Olga Rozanova photo

“Principles heretofore unknown, signifying the emergence of a new era in creative work - an era of purely artistic achievements. An era of the final emancipation of the Great Art of Painting from Literary, Social, and crudely everyday attributes uncharacteristic of it at its core. The elaboration of this valuable world outlook is the service of our times, irrespective of idle speculation about how quickly the individual trends created by it will flash by.”

Olga Rozanova (1886–1918) Russian artist

Olga Rozanova, in 'Osnovy Novogo Tvorchestva i printsipy ego neponimaniia,' Soiuz molodezhi 3 (March 1913), pp. 20-21; as quoted by Svetlana Dzhafarova, in The great Utopia - The Russian and Soviet Avant-Garde, 1915-1932 (transl. Jane Bobko); Guggenheim Museum, New York, 1992, p. 477

Billy Joel photo
Elon Musk photo

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

Elon Musk (1971) South African-born American entrepreneur

Conversation: Elon Musk on Wired Science (2007)

Marino Marini photo
Ray Comfort photo
Paul Klee photo

“At the moment, an unpleasant feeling presses on my stomach, as though the new year of the unified, national Germany has assisted in the advent of an all too torch-parade-like sparkling wine bacchanal.”

Paul Klee (1879–1940) German Swiss painter

Quote in a letter to his wife Lily Klee, 1 February 1933; as quoted in 'Klee & Kandinsky', 2015 exhibition text, Lenbachhaus und Kunstbau Munich, 2015-2016 https://www.zpk.org/en/exhibitions/review_0/2015/klee-kandinsky-969.html
in the same year Paul Klee was fired by the Nazi's; they closed the Bauhaus; the family Klee emigrated to Switzerland
1931 -1940

Aron Ra photo
Eric Hoffer photo
Haruki Murakami photo
Revilo P. Oliver photo
Tom Lehrer photo
Christopher Hitchens photo

“They want me to immolate myself, and I sincerely believe that for some of them, when they see bad news from Iraq, the reaction is simply 'This will make Hitchens look bad!' I've been trying to avoid solipsism, but I've come to believe there are such people.”

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

"He Knew He Was Right," profile by Ian Parker, The New Yorker (2006-10-16): On the 2003 invasion of Iraq
2000s, 2006

Anthony Zinni photo

“We promised the Iraqi people freedom, democracy, security and a new and far better life.”

Anthony Zinni (1943) American Marine Corps general

The Battle for Peace

Alan Hirsch photo
David Rockefeller photo
Theresa May photo
James K. Morrow photo

“The new homeland bulged with the sort of free-for-the-grabbing bounty that invites greed, envy, exploitation, profiteering, and politics.”

James K. Morrow (1947) (1947-) science fiction author

Source: The Wine of Violence (1981), Chapter 1 (p. 12)

Nycole Turmel photo
Chen Shui-bian photo

“The new government will have three major improvements. It is time to improve the economy in Taiwan.”

Chen Shui-bian (1950) Taiwanese politician

Speech to the World Federation of Taiwanese Associations, March 17, 2002
Pet Phrases, 2002

Ali Al-Wardi photo
Fernand Léger photo

“The concept of Abstract painting is not a passing abstraction, good only for a few initiates, [but] the total expression of a new generation whose necessities it experiences and to all of whose aspirations it constitutes a response.”

Fernand Léger (1881–1955) French painter

quote, 1920
Quote of Leger in: Abstract Painting, Michel Seuphor, Dell Publishing Co., 1964, p. 16
Quotes of Fernand Leger, 1920's

Francis Parkman photo
Christopher Hitchens photo
Orson Pratt photo

“We planted our crops in the spring, and they came up, and were looking nicely, and we were cheered with the hopes of having a very abundant harvest. But alas! it very soon appeared as if our crops were going to be swallowed up by a vast horde of crickets, that came down from these mountains-crickets very different to what I used to be acquainted with in the State of New York. They were crickets nearly as large as a man's thumb. They came in immense droves, so that men and women with brush could make no headway against them; but we cried unto the Lord in our afflictions, and the Lord heard us, and sent thousands and tens of thousands of a small white bird. I have not seen any of them lately. Many called them gulls, although they were different from the seagulls that live on the Atlantic coast. And what did they do for us? They went to work, and by thousands and tens of thousands, began to devour them up, and still we thought that even they could not prevail against so large and mighty an army. But we noticed, that when they had apparently filled themselves with these crickets, they would go and vomit them up, and again go to work and fill themselves, and so they continued to do, until the land was cleared of crickets, and our crops were saved. There are those who will say that this was one of the natural courses of events, that there was no miracle in it. Let that be as it may, we esteemed it as a blessing from the hand of God; miracle or no miracle, we believe that God had a hand in it, and it does not matter particularly whether strangers believe or not.”

Orson Pratt (1811–1881) Apostle of the LDS Church

Journal of Discourses 21:276-277 (June 20,1880)
Pratt describes the event in which seagulls disposed of swarms of crickets that were destroying their crops.
Miracle of the seagulls and crickets

Carl Van Doren photo
Tim Powers photo
Edward Bernays photo
John Ruysbroeck photo
James K. Morrow photo

“The state flower of New Jersey is the common violet,” she explained, smirking, “the state bird is the eastern goldfinch, and the state fragrance is unrefined petroleum.”

James K. Morrow (1947) (1947-) science fiction author

Source: The Philosopher's Apprentice (2008), Chapter 14 (p. 319)

Bill McKibben photo
Anita Dunn photo
Seneca the Younger photo

“Should I be surprised that dangers which have always surrounded me should at last attack me? A great part of mankind, when about to sail, do not think of a storm. I shall never be ashamed of a reporter of bad news in a good cause.”

Seneca the Younger (-4–65 BC) Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, and dramatist

Variant translation: I shall never be ashamed of citing a bad author if the line is good.
On Tranquility of the Mind

Alan Hirsch photo

“The missional church is not a new trend or the latest new technique for reaching postmodern people.”

Alan Hirsch (1959) South African missionary

Source: The Faith of Leap (2011), p. 160

Carl Schmitt photo
Nicholas Stern, Baron Stern of Brentford photo

“We should remember that the last time global temperature was 5C different from today, the Earth was gripped by an ice age. So the risks are immense and can only be sensibly managed by reducing greenhouse gas emissions, which will require a new low-carbon industrial revolution.”

Nicholas Stern, Baron Stern of Brentford (1946) British economist and academic

"Climate change is here now and it could lead to global conflict" http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/feb/13/storms-floods-climate-change-upon-us-lord-stern, The Guardian (14 February 2014).

Paul Fussell photo
Edwin Lefèvre photo

“the public never is independently responsive to news.”

Source: Reminiscences of a Stock Operator (1923), Chapter VI, p. 69

Donald A. Norman photo
Upton Sinclair photo
Aldous Huxley photo

“We may not appreciate the fact; but a fact nevertheless it remains: we are living in a Golden Age, the most gilded Golden Age of human history — not only of past history, but of future history. For, as Sir Charles Darwin and many others before him have pointed out, we are living like drunken sailors, like the irresponsible heirs of a millionaire uncle. At an ever accelerating rate we are now squandering the capital of metallic ores and fossil fuels accumulated in the earth’s crust during hundreds of millions of years. How long can this spending spree go on? Estimates vary. But all are agreed that within a few centuries or at most a few millennia, Man will have run through his capital and will be compelled to live, for the remaining nine thousand nine hundred and seventy or eighty centuries of his career as Homo sapiens, strictly on income. Sir Charles is of the opinion that Man will successfully make the transition from rich ores to poor ores and even sea water, from coal, oil, uranium and thorium to solar energy and alcohol derived from plants. About as much energy as is now available can be derived from the new sources — but with a far greater expense in man hours, a much larger capital investment in machinery. And the same holds true of the raw materials on which industrial civilization depends. By doing a great deal more work than they are doing now, men will contrive to extract the diluted dregs of the planet’s metallic wealth or will fabricate non-metallic substitutes for the elements they have completely used up. In such an event, some human beings will still live fairly well, but not in the style to which we, the squanderers of planetary capital, are accustomed.”

Aldous Huxley (1894–1963) English writer

"Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow" in Adonis and the Alphabet (1956); later in Collected Essays (1959), p. 293

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad photo
Herbert Kroemer photo

“Ultimately, progress in applications is not deterministic, but opportunistic, exploiting for new applications whatever new science and technology happen to be coming along.”

Herbert Kroemer (1928) Nobel laureate in physics

in his Nobel Lecture http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2000/kroemer-lecture.html, Quasi-Electric Fields and Band Offsets: Teaching Electrons New Tricks, 8 December 2000, at Aula Magna, Stockholm University.

Roberto Mangabeira Unger photo
Benjamin Stanton photo
James Jeans photo
Billy Joel photo
Margaret Mead photo
Emily Brontë photo
Mitt Romney photo

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

Mitt Romney (1947) American businessman and politician

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

Antonin Scalia photo
Hugo Chávez photo

“Israel has gone mad. It's attacking, doing the same thing to the Palestinian and Lebanese people that they have criticised - and with reason - the Holocaust. But this is a new Holocaust.”

Hugo Chávez (1954–2013) 48th President of Venezuela

In protest of Israel's military offensive in Lebanon. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/5258722.stm
2006

Alan Blinder photo
Eric Foner photo
L. Ron Hubbard photo
Roger Manganelli photo
Eric Hobsbawm photo
Tad Williams photo

“Strangely, although the world is already full of fearful things, mortals seems always to hunt for new worries.”

Tad Williams (1957) novelist

Source: Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn, To Green Angel Tower (1993), Part 2, Chapter 13, “The Fallen Sun” (p. 307).

Maurice Glasman, Baron Glasman photo
Aldous Huxley photo
Patrick Buchanan photo
Adolf Hitler photo

“Our Italian ally has been a source of embarrassment to us everywhere. It was this alliance, for instance, which prevented us from pursuing a revolutionary policy in North Africa. In the nature of things, this territory was becoming an Italian preserve and it was as such that the Duce laid claim to it. Had we been on our own, we could have emancipated the Moslem countries dominated by France; and that would have had enormous repercussions in the Near East, dominated by Britain, and in Egypt. But with our fortunes linked to those of the Italians, the pursuit of such a policy was not possible. All Islam vibrated at the news of our victories. The Egyptians, the Irakis and the whole of the Near East were all ready to rise in revolt. Just think what we could have done to help them, even to incite them, as would have been both our duty and in our own interest! But the presence of the Italians at our side paralysed us; it created a feeling of malaise among our Islamic friends, who inevitably saw in us accomplices, willing or unwilling, of their oppressors. For the Italians in these parts of the world are more bitterly hated, of course, than either the British or the French. The memories of the barbarous, reprisals taken against the Senussi are still vivid. Then again the ridiculous pretensions of the Duce to be regarded as The Sword of Islam evokes the same sneering chuckle now as it did before the war. This title, which is fitting for Mahomed and a great conqueror like Omar, Mussolini caused to be conferred on himself by a few wretched brutes whom he had either bribed or terrorized into doing so. We had a great chance of pursuing a splendid policy with regard to Islam. But we missed the bus, as we missed it on several other occasions, thanks to our loyalty to the Italian alliance! In this theatre of operations, then, the Italians prevented us from playing our best card, the emancipation of the French subjects and the raising of the standard of revolt in the countries oppressed by the British. Such a policy would have aroused the enthusiasm of the whole of Islam. It is a characteristic of the Moslem world, from the shores of the Atlantic to those of the Pacific, that what affects one, for good or for evil, affects all.”

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

17 February 1945.
Disputed, The Testament of Adolf Hitler (1945)

Norman Foster, Baron Foster of Thames Bank photo
John F. Kennedy photo

“This increase in the life span and in the number of our senior citizens presents this Nation with increased opportunities: the opportunity to draw upon their skill and sagacity — and the opportunity to provide the respect and recognition they have earned. It is not enough for a great nation merely to have added new years to life — our objective must also be to add new life to those years.”

John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) 35th president of the United States of America

Special message to the Congress on the needs of the nation’s senior citizens (21 February 1963); in Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy, 1963, p. 189
1963

John Morley, 1st Viscount Morley of Blackburn photo
Joseph Addison photo
Richard Nixon photo
Pat Condell photo

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

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

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

Kent Hovind photo
S. H. Raza photo

“Installations are usually very mediocre. These new ideas are alright to promote themselves but I think real promotion can be done if they make good paintings or good sculptures.”

S. H. Raza (1922–2016) Indian artist

His views on the 3D art, installations and the new forms of art.
Indian contemporary artists have not reached my standard: SH Raza

Herm Edwards photo
Douglas Coupland photo
Tina Fey photo
Adrienne von Speyr photo
John D. Carmack photo
Bill Gates photo
Gino Severini photo
Tony Blair photo

“A New Britain where the extraordinary talent of the British people is liberated from the forces of conservatism that so long have held them back, to create a model 21st century nation, based not on privilege, class or background, but on the equal worth of all.”

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

Tony Blair's speech in full http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/460009.stm, BBC News online
Speech to the Labour Party conference, 28 September 1999.
1990s

Peter F. Drucker photo

“We do not need more laws. No country suffers from a shortage of laws. We need a new model.”

Peter F. Drucker (1909–2005) American business consultant

Source: 1960s - 1980s, MANAGEMENT: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices (1973), Part 1, p. 364

Evelyn Underhill photo
Terry Winograd photo

“The main activity of programming is not the origination of new independent programs, but in the integration, modification, and explanation of existing ones.”

Terry Winograd (1946) American computer scientist

"Beyond Programming Languages", in Artificial intelligence & software engineering (1991), ed. Derek Partridge, p. 317.

Robert Fisk photo
Bart D. Ehrman photo
Pete Doherty photo

“New York City's very pretty in the night-time
But oh, don't you miss Soho?”

Pete Doherty (1979) English musician, writer, actor, poet and artist

"The Boy Looked at Johnny"(with Carl Barat)
Lyrics and poetry

Charles Krauthammer photo

“Obama’s NASA budget perfectly captures the difference between Kennedy's liberalism and Obama's. Kennedy's was an expansive, bold, outward-looking summons, Obama's is a constricted inward-looking call to retreat. Fifty years ago, Kennedy opened the New Frontier. Obama has just shut it.”

Charles Krauthammer (1950–2018) American journalist

Column, February 12, 2010, "Closing the New Frontier" http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/krauthammer021210.php3#.U4HLMMJOWUl at jewishworldreview.com.
2010s, 2010

“The musical language which made the classical style possible is that of tonality, which was not a massive, immobile system but a living, gradually changing language from its beginning. It had reached a new and important turning point just before the style of Haydn and Mozart took shape.”

Charles Rosen (1927–2012) American pianist and writer on music

Part I. Introduction. 1. The Musical Language of the Late Eighteenth Century
Classical Style: Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven (Expanded edition, 1997)

Frederik Pohl photo