Quotes about today
page 17

“The question was what's happening to the individual in America? Is the individual going the way of the environment, being destroyed? In other words, were we becoming the creatures of the machine?
That was the way people thought in the '60s. Now maybe that's passé today but that's the kind of thing people thought about. Are we turning into machines? They wanted to rebel against that.
Their rebellion cannot be called a success by any means, far from it. Those of us who tried are very grateful that we tried to the degree we did. Anybody who achieved any success against the machine feels good about it.”

Charles A. Reich (1928–2019) American lawyer

The Greening of America turns 40 (2010)

People, Way, Feeling, Question

“People today are still living off the table scraps of the sixties. They are still being passed around — the music and the ideas.”

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

The Guardian (13 February 1992)

People, Music, Idea

“(Television announcer) The Supreme Court staggered the nation today when they ruled that conception begins the minute you think about sex.”

Nicole Hollander (1939) Cartoonist

Variant: (Television announcer) The Supreme Court staggered the nation today when they ruled that conception begins the minute you think about sex. (pp. 60-61)
Source: Sylvia cartoon strip, pp. 60-61

Sex, Thinking

“God’s blessing has been on America from the very beginning of this nation, and I believe God isn’t done with America yet. I believe in you. I believe in the power of millions of courageous conservatives rising up to reignite the promise of America, and that is why today I am announcing that I’m running for president of the United States. It is a time for truth. It is a time for liberty. It is a time to reclaim the Constitution of the United States.”

Ted Cruz (1970) American politician

Presidential declaration speech, Ted Cruz declaration speech: Full transcript http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/ted-cruz-declaration-speech-full-transcript-10128614.html, Independant.co.uk (March 23, 2015) 2010s

God, Truth, Courage, Time

“As long as I'm the director of Miss Nevada, we will never award fur coats as prizes, and I urge my fellow pageant directors to make the same pledge. Kind people today are taking a stand against cruelty to animals—so a fur coat is no prize for a compassionate, socially-aware woman.”

Shanna Moakler (1975) American actress and model

Statement to PETA, as quoted in "Miss USA Winners Pose Naked in Sexy New PETA Ad", E! Online (June 13, 2013) https://www.eonline.com/uk/news/429232/miss-usa-winners-pose-naked-in-sexy-new-peta-ad-check-it-out.

People, Animals

“Success is about executing what you are doing today with unquestionable, breathtaking excellence.”

Tom Peters (1942) American writer on business management practices

13 February 2017
Tom Peters Daily, Weekly Quote

Success

“It’s six months since I did the interview with Jeremy Paxman that inspired this book, and British media today is awash with halfhearted condemnations of my observation that voting is pointless and my admission that I have never voted. My assertion that other people oughtn’t vote either was born of the same instinctive rejection of the mantle of appointed social prefect that prevents me from telling teenagers to “Just Say No” to drugs. I cannot confine my patronage to the circuitry of their minuscule wisdom. “People died so you’d have the right to vote.” No, they did not; they died for freedom. In the case where freedom was explicitly attached to the symbol of democratic rights, like female suffrage, I don’t imagine they’d’ve been so willing if they’d known how tokenistic voting was to become. Note too these martyrs did not achieve their ends by participating in a hollow, predefined ritual, the infertile dry hump of gestural democracy; they did it by direct action. Emily Davison, the hero of women’s suffrage, hurled herself in front of the king’s horses; she defied the tyranny that oppressed her and broke the boundaries that contained her. I imagine too that this woman would have had the rebellious perspicacity to understand that the system she was opposing would adjust to incorporate the female vote and deftly render it irrelevant. This woman, who left her job as a teacher to dedicate her life to activism, was imprisoned nine times. She used methods as severe and diverse as arson and hunger-striking to protest and at the time of her death would have been regarded as a terrorist.”

Russell Brand book Revolution

Revolution (2014)

Life, Death, Wisdom, Women

“Personal computing today is a rich ecosystem encompassing massive PC-based data centers, notebook and Tablet PCs, handheld devices, and smart cell phones. It has expanded from the desktop and the data center to wherever people need it — at their desks, in a meeting, on the road or even in the air.”

Bill Gates (1955) American business magnate and philanthropist

"The PC Era Is Just Beginning" in Business Week (22 March 2005) http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/mar2005/tc20050322_7219.htm 2000s

People, Personality

“Given the goals of rogue states and terrorists, the United States can no longer solely rely on a reactive posture as we have in the past. The inability to deter a potential attacker, the immediacy of today’s threats, and the magnitude of potential harm that could be caused by our adversaries’ choice of weapons, do not permit that option. We cannot let our enemies strike first.”

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

From the document “ The National Security Strategy of the United States of America http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/nsc/nss5.html,” (June 1, 2002) 2000s, 2002

Past

“I haven't the arrogance to say I can carry the mighty load of His Cross, but I do try to walk in its shadow. He wants to carve your life like a crucifix. Every calamity is a crucifixion, crucifying your ambition, your lust. Each is a tiny lesson, and then the imprint of the crucifixion is on your life. What is your plan of sacrifice today? You and I, petty souls, sacrifice for our children. Christ sacrificed for tomorrow's whole world. Whenever I see slum-dwellers, with their hunger and poverty, that obscene poverty, I feel He is crucified like that. When I come across a person suffering from leprosy, foul smelling, ulcerous, I can see the imprint of His lips, His kiss. What did they not do to sufferers of leprosy in His time, yet the carpenter's son cared for them and touched them. That hand is an emblem for me, that hand which cared for the loneliest and the lost. The Christian is … he who not only lights the darkest corner in the world but also the darkest corner in his own heart.”

Baba Amte (1914–2008) Indian freedom fighter, social worker

On Christ
Baba Amte's Words of Wisdom

Life, Hunger, Children, World

“Is “democracy,” as we understand the term today, an implementation of “self-government,” as this ideal was formulated when representative institutions were first established? The evidence is mixed.”

Adam Przeworski (1940) Polish-American academic

Democracy and the Limits of Self-Government (2010), Chapter 8. Democracy as an Implementation of Self-Government in Our Times

Democracy, Understanding

“The whole culture of wearing flags on our lapel and saying ‘we’ when referring to the United States and, even the ‘shock and awe’ of the initial stages, it was just too jubilant and just a little uncomfortable. And I remember feeling, when I was anchoring the ‘Today’ show, this inevitable march towards war and kind of feeling like, ‘Will anybody put the brakes on this?’ And is this really being properly challenged by the right people? And I think, at the time, anyone who questioned the administration was considered unpatriotic and it was a very difficult position to be in.”

Katie Couric (1957) American journalist

National Press club speech, September 25, 2007. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1902464/posts

War, People, Feeling, Question

“Of all the fighters today, I have to say that Mayweather reminds me most of me," Leonard told Irish boxing writer Brian Doogan in describing the incident. "The kid has every gift and physical attribute, but if he continues to be the kind of person he is, he'll never be one of us. He'll never make it.”

Sugar Ray Leonard (1956) American boxer

Sugar Ray Leonard on Floyd Mayweather, Jr. http://forums.doghouseboxing.com/index.php?showtopic=83714

Personality, Box

“As a metaphor - and I stress that it is intended as a metaphor - the concept of an invariant that arises out of mutually or cyclically balancing changes may help us to approach the concept of self. In cybernetics this metaphor is implemented in the ‘closed loop’, the circular arrangement of feedback mechanisms that maintain a given value within certain limits. They work toward an invariant, but the invariant is achieved not by a steady resistance, the way a rock stands unmoved in the wind, but by compensation over time. Whenever we happen to look in a feedback loop, we find the present act pitted against the immediate past, but already on the way to being compensated itself by the immediate future. The invariant the system achieves can, therefore, never be found or frozen in a single element because, by its very nature, it consists in one or more relationships - and relationships are not in things but between them.
If the self, as I suggest, is a relational entity, it cannot have a locus in the world of experiential objects. It does not reside in the heart, as Aristotle thought, nor in the brain, as we tend to think today. It resides in no place at all, but merely manifests itself in the continuity of our acts of differentiating and relating and in the intuitive certainty we have that our experience is truly ours.”

Ernst von Glasersfeld (1917–2010) German philosopher

Source: Cybernetics, Experience and the Concept of Self, 1970, pp.186-7 cited in: Vincent Kenny (2010) Remembering Ernst von Glasersfeld http://www.oikos.org/vonen.htm at oikos.org, retrieved Oct 11, 2012.

World, Way, Nature, Thinking

“A good book is the best of friends, the same today and forever.”

Martin Farquhar Tupper (1810–1889) English writer and poet

Of Reading.
Proverbial Philosophy (1838-1849)

Books

“As I write, a bee flies into my window and an ant crawls along the balcony. The ant and the bee are enjoying their present temporary life even as I am enjoying my temporary existence. When I become an "ancient one," so too will the ant and the bee become an "ancient bee" and an "ancient ant." What mystery and what joy that I should be living today at this hour by this place before this window with pen, inkstone, and paper spread before me, while my mind thinks and my hand writes in the company of the present bee and the present ant!”

Jin Shengtan (1610–1661) Chinese writer

"What Can I Do About It?"

Life, Thinking, Bee, Joy

“Her handwriting in these pencilled jottings, made forty-five years ago, is exactly as it is today: this makes me suspect, when I am not with her, that she is a closet intellectual.”

Helen Garner (1942) Australian author

In the title story Postcards from Surfers.
Garner describing her mother.
Postcards from Surfers (1985)

“The sixth grade seemed to please him from the beginning: he went through a brief Egyptian Period that baffled me — he tried to walk flat a great deal, sticking one arm in front of him and one in back of him, putting one foot behind the other. He declared Egyptians walked that way; I said if they did I didn't see how they got anything done, but Jem said they accomplished more than the Americans ever did, they invented toilet paper and perpetual embalming, and asked where would we be today if they hadn't? Atticus told me to delete the adjectives and I'd have the facts.”

Harper Lee book To Kill a Mockingbird

Pt. 1, ch. 7
Jean Louise (Scout) Finch
To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)

Way

“Better off? The point is illustrated by the great African American boxer Muhammad Ali. In the early 1970s Muhammad Ali fought for the heavyweight title against George Foreman. The fight was held in the African nation of Zaire; it was insensitively called the "rumble in the jungle." Ali won the fight, and upon returning to the United States, he was asked by a reporter, "Champ, what did you think of Africa?" Ali replied, "Thank God my granddaddy got on that boat!" There is a characteristic mischievous pungency to Ali's remark, yet it also expresses a widely held sentiment. Ali recognizes that for all the horror of slavery, it was the transmission belt that brought Africans into the orbit of Western freedom. The slaves were not better off—the boat Ali refers to brought the slaves through a horrific Middle Passage to a life of painful servitude—yet their descendants today, even if they won't admit it, are better off. Ali was honest enough to admit it.”

Dinesh D'Souza (1961) Indian-American political commentator, filmmaker, author

Source: Books, America: Imagine a World without Her (2014), Ch. 8. Most likely a misattribution. A Newsweek article at the time of the match attributed the quote "Thank God our grandpappies caught that boat!" to George Foreman's manager Dick Sadler. "It Takes a Heap of Salongo", Newsweek (September 23, 1974), p. 72.

Life, God, Pain, Thinking

“One hears murmurs against Mussolini on the ground that he is a desperado: the real objection to him is that he is a politician. Indeed, he is probably the most perfect specimen of the genus politician on view in the world today. His career has been impeccably classical. Beginning life as a ranting Socialist of the worst type, he abjured Socialism the moment he saw better opportunities for himself on the other side, and ever since then he has devoted himself gaudily to clapping Socialists in jail, filling them with castor oil, sending blacklegs to burn down their houses, and otherwise roughing them. Modern politics has produced no more adept practitioner.”

H.L. Mencken (1880–1956) American journalist and writer

"Mussolini" in the Baltimore Evening Sun (3 August 1931), also in A Second Mencken Chrestomathy : New Selections from the Writings of America's Legendary Editor, Critic, and Wit (1994) edited by Terry Teachout, p. 34
1930s

Life, World, Housing, Perfection

“And so, from this day forth, we want all the more to let our thoughts revolve around and hover over Socrates and Christ at all times, openly taking pride that they are more alive for us than all those living today and that we listen to and love them as we do none of the living.”

Constantin Brunner (1862–1937) German philosopher

Source: Our Christ : The Revolt of the Mystical Genius (1921), p. 188

Love, Time, Christ

“We are here today, not so much as to launch a political party but more so and more importantly we are here today to project a vision that will inspire hope.”

Epeli Ganilau (1951) Fijian politician

Excerpts from a speech at the launch of the NAP, 8 April 2005

Hope

“God says in Jeremiah 16 — "Behold I will bring them the Jewish people again unto their land that I gave unto their fathers" — that would be Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - "Behold I will send for many fishers and after will I send for many hunters. And they the hunters shall hunt them" — that will be the Jews — "from every mountain and from every hill and from out of the holes of the rocks." If that doesn't describe what Hitler did in the Holocaust — you can't see that. So think about this — I will send fishers and I will send hunters. A fisher is someone who entices you with a bait. How many of you know who Theodore Herzl was? How many of you don't have a clue who he was? Woo, sweet God! Theodore Herzl is the father of Zionism. He was a Jew that at the turn of the 19th century said, "this land is our land, God wants us to live there". So he went to the Jews of Europe and said, "I want you to come and join me in the land of Israel". So few went, Herzl went into depression. Those who came founded Israel; those who did not went through the hell of the Holocaust. Then God sent a hunter. A hunter is someone who comes with a gun and he forces you. Hitler was a hunter. And the Bible says — Jeremiah righty? — "they shall hunt them from every mountain and from every hill and out of the holes of the rocks", meaning: there's no place to hide. And that will be offensive to some people. Well, dear heart, be offended: I didn't write it. Jeremiah wrote it. It was the truth and it is the truth. How did it happen? Because God allowed it to happen. Why did it happen? Because God said, "my top priority for the Jewish people is to get them to come back to the land of Israel". Today Israel is back in the land and they are at Ezekiel 37 and 8. They are physically alive but they're not spiritually alive. Now how is God going to cause the Jewish people to come spiritually alive and say, "the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, He is God"?”

John Hagee (1940) American pastor, theologian and saxophonist

late 2005 sermon at Cornerstone Church, quoted in

God, People, Truth, Mountain

“When this assembly reconvened, the world's media descended - doubtless seeking signs of strife and discord. What struck me then and indeed strikes me today was the ability of members to understand and respect their differences - however fundamental - whilst committing to providing better government for the people of Northern Ireland.”

Alex Salmond (1954) Scottish National Party politician and former First Minister of Scotland

Scotland and Northern Ireland (June 18, 2007)

People, World, Understanding

“Nowadays, the phenomenon (of division of labor) has developed so generally it is obvious to all. We need have no further illusions about the tendencies of modern industry; it advances steadily towards powerful machines, towards great concentrations of forces and capital, and consequently to the extreme division of labor. Occupations are infinitely separated and specialized, not only inside the factories, but each product is itself a specialty dependent upon others. Adam Smith and John Stuart Mill still hoped that agriculture, at least, would be an exception to the rule, and they saw it as the last resort of small-scale industry. Although one must be careful not to generalize unduly in such matters, nevertheless it is hard to deny today that the principal branches of the agricultural industry are steadily being drawn into the general movement. Finally, business itself is ingeniously following and reflecting in all its shadings the infinite diversity of industrial enterprises; and, while this evolution is realizing itself with unpremeditated spontaneity, the economists, examining its causes and appreciating its results, far from condemning or opposing it, uphold it as necessary. They see in it the supreme law of human societies and the condition of their progress.”

Émile Durkheim (1858–1917) French sociologist (1858-1917)

Source: The Division of Labor in Society (1893), p. 39; Second paragraph

Law, Hope, Business, Dependency

“When only men could register to vote, we required only men to register for the draft. Today both sexes can vote, but only men must register for the draft.”

Warren Farrell (1943) author, spokesperson, expert witness, political candidate

Source: Father and Child Reunion (2001), p. 132.

Men, Sex

“Being controversial in politics is inevitable. If an individual wants to be a leader and isn't controversial, that means he never stood for anything. In the world today, there are not many good choices — only choices between the half-good and the less half-good.”

Richard Nixon (1913–1994) 37th President of the United States of America

Cited in Nick Thimmesch's "An interview with Nixon: 'Defeated, but not finished'" (Chicago Tribune (11 December 1978)
1970s

World

“(transcripts from Council of Ministers meeting 13 noiembrie 1941) I. Antonescu: „I'd like you to remove all Jews from Odesa immediately, because the resistence at Sevastopol makes us think that we can expect a landing at Odesa. I thought Sevastopol will fall earlier. Yet today, because the Russian fleet has the possibility to use Sevastopol, it can make us an unpleasent surpirse.””

Ion Antonescu (1882–1946) prime minister and conducător of Romania during World War II

Thinking

“Baghdad is liberated. In the days to come let us not forget that if it was not for one man, and one man alone — George Bush — the people of Iraq would not be celebrating in the streets and pulling down Saddam's statues today… We have entered the era of a new civil war between the forces of freedom and the powers of Islamo-fascist and communist darkness, and once again the left is clearly determined to take its stand on the other side. The good news is that America is back. Our military has performed superlatively. Our leadership has stood tall. We ourselves can celebrate over this and look confidently towards what lies ahead.”

David Horowitz (1939) Neoconservative activist, writer

[David, Horowitz, http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=7189, Editorial: Liberation, FrontPageMagazine.com, April 9, 2003, 2007-02-17]
2003

War, People, Confidence, Freedom

“The old SV (Socialist Left Party) were useful idiots for the communists in Moscow. Today's SV are useful idiots for Saddam Hussein.”

Carl I. Hagen (1944) Norwegian politician

In connection with the 2003 invasion of Iraq, published in Aftenposten (23 February 2003) http://www.aftenposten.no/nyheter/iriks/politikk/article495928.ece

“Today the world changes so quickly that in growing up we take leave not just of youth but of the world we were young in. I suppose we all realize the degree to which fear and resentment of what is new is really a lament for the memories of our childhood.”

Peter Medawar (1915–1987) scientist

1960s, Presidential Address, 1969

Youth, World, Fear, Memory

“.. can you [contemporary painters] ever get close, even vaguely, to the solidity, the transparency, the lyric strength of colour, to the clarity, the mystery, the emotion of any of the paintings of Fra Angelico, Piero della Francesca, Botticelli, Dürer, Holbein or of young Raphael? Friends, have you ever realized that with the oil colours used today this is absolutely impossible?... In the museums of Europe I have observed the work of the Flemish painters at length – those earlier, later as well as contemporary to the [brothers] Van Eycks – and I am convinced that the above mentioned brothers were not the discoverers of oil paint in its true sense, as is held today, but that what they did was introduce oil in emulsion with other substances, especially live and fossil resins, into so-called oil tempera emulsion, which was already known in the Flanders, to enable them through the use of veiling to give a greater finish, cleanliness and strength of colour to their painting.
'These oils which are their tempera' said Vasari, speaking of the Flemish [painters] in his Life of Antonello; and without doubt he was alluding to Flemish oil tempera emulsion, but it is sure, absolutely sure, that.... we are dealing with.... a tempera based mixture (egg, glue, resin, tempera etc) in which oil was only used as a means of unity and for the finish of the painting.”

Giorgio de Chirico (1888–1978) Italian artist

Quote from De Chirico's text 'Pro tempera oratio', c. 1920; from 'PRO TEMPERA ORATIO' http://www.fondazionedechirico.org/wp-content/uploads/475-480Metafisica5_6.pdf, p. 475 1920s and later

Life, Sense, Painting

“By nation of origin of our people, by 2050, America will be a Third World country. Our great cities will all look like Los Angeles today. Los Angeles and the cities of the Southwest will look like Juarez and Tijuana…”

Patrick Buchanan (1938) American politician and commentator

2000s, State of Emergency (2006)

People, World, Angels, Country

“Today just 400 Americans have more wealth than half of all Americans combined.”

Michael Moore (1954) American filmmaker, author, social critic, and liberal activist

Speech delivered at Wisconsin Capitol in Madison (5 March 2011) Claim found to be "true" by PolitiFact and others. 2011 Source: [Moore, Michael, America Is Not Broke, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-moore/america-is-not-broke_b_832006.html, 6 March 2011, Huffington Post, 11 August 2013] Source: [Kertscher, Tom, Borowski, Greg, The Truth-O-Meter Says: True - Michael Moore says 400 Americans have more wealth than half of all Americans combined, http://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/statements/2011/mar/10/michael-moore/michael-moore-says-400-americans-have-more-wealth-/, 10 March 2011, PolitiFact, 11 August 2013] Source: [Moore, Michael, Michael Moore, The Forbes 400 vs. Everybody Else, http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/must-read/forbes-400-vs-everybody-else, March 7, 2011, michaelmoore.com http://www.michaelmoore.com/, yes, 2011-03-09, 2014-08-28, http://web.archive.org/web/20110309211959/http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/must-read/forbes-400-vs-everybody-else] Source: [Pepitone, Julianne, Forbes 400: The super-rich get richer, http://money.cnn.com/2010/09/22/news/companies/forbes_400/index.htm, 22 September 2010, CNN, 11 August 2013] Source: [Johnson, Dave, 9 Pictures That Expose This Country's Obscene Division of Wealth, http://www.alternet.org/story/149918/9_pictures_that_expose_this_country%27s_obscene_division_of_wealth, 14 February 2011, Alternet, 11 August 2013]

Wealth

“But with today's mammoth papers the poor boobs have to write at ten times the length their subject is worth, and apart from over-padded news we have the curse of modern journalism, the proliferation of the commentary, the background exposition, the in-depth analysis, the "think-piece", all adding up to an indigestible stream of crap which no one wants to read, and no one, to judge by the mechanical repetition and weary rambling, wants to write either.”

George MacDonald Fraser (1925–2008) English-born author of Scottish descent

Dumbing Down, Down, Down... p. 253-254.
The Light's On At Signpost (2002)

Thinking, Time, Reading

“Clearly, no longer can a dictator count on East-West confrontation to stymie concerted United Nations action against aggression. A new partnership of nations has begun. And we stand today at a unique and extraordinary moment. The crisis in the Persian Gulf, as grave as it is, also offers a rare opportunity to move toward an historic period of cooperation. Out of these troubled times, our fifth objective — a new world order — can emerge: a new era, freer from the threat of terror, stronger in the pursuit of justice, and more secure in the quest for peace. An era in which the nations of the world, east and west, north and south, can prosper and live in harmony.”

George H. W. Bush (1924–2018) American politician, 41st President of the United States

Speech to joint session of Congress (11 September 1990), as quoted in Encyclopedia of Leadership (2004) by George R. Goethals, Georgia Jones Sorenson, and James MacGregor Burns, p. 1776 http://books.google.com/books?id=kjLspnsZS4UC&pg=RA4-PA1776&dq=%22Out+of+these+troubled+times+our+fifth+objective+a+new+world+order+can+emerge%22&num=100&ei=JoabR-ieJZjSigH106CoCg&ie=ISO-8859-1&sig=75hwmo0dYLCTYEOSWyXaECUpMzA and Confrontation in the Gulf; Transcript of President's Address to Joint Session of Congress http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0CE6DF113CF931A2575AC0A966958260 The New York Times. September 12, 1990.

World, Peace, Justice, Time

“Indeed, as I think about it, I have to conclude that these young people before me today are the best reason for hope that this world knows.”

Mario Cuomo (1932–2015) American politician, Governor of New York

Address at Iona College (1984)

People, World, Hope, Thinking

“The poor Palestinians who today kill Jews with explosives and firebombs and stones are part of the same people who when they had all the territories they now demand be given to them for their state -attempted to drive the Jewish state into the sea.”

Meir Kahane (1932–1990) American/Israeli political activist and rabbi

Thinking Catholic Strategic Center http://www.thinking-catholic-strategic-center.com/Rabbi-Meir-Kahane-Open-Letter.html

People, Parting, Sea

“I urge all of you today, especially those who are students, to act, to enter the lists of public service and rightly win or lose the prize. For we can have only one form of aristocracy in this country, as Jefferson wrote long ago in rejecting John Adams' suggestion of an artificial aristocracy of wealth and birth. It is, he wrote, the natural aristocracy of character and talent, and the best form of government, he added, was that which selected these men for positions of responsibility.”

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

1963, Address at Vanderbilt University

Men, Birth, Nature, Country

“Today we experience, in reverse, what pre-literate man faced with the advent of writing.”

Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar-- a professor of English literature, a literary critic, and a …

Source: 1990s and beyond, A McLuhan Sourcebook (1995), p. 273

“This is one of the mutterings which they are muttering today: "The social well-being of the people, the upward movement of the non-propertied or labour classes to material welfare, is continually being obstructed by conceptions of political subserviency and passive obedience to despotic authority, which is directly traceable to Christian doctrine."”

Bouck White (1874–1951) American author and novelist

Source: The Call of the Carpenter (1914), p. xvii

People

“I think we may well have some kind of presence there over a period of time… The level of activity that we see today from a military standpoint, I think, will clearly decline. I think they're in the last throes, if you will, of the insurgency.”

Dick Cheney (1941) American politician and businessman

Larry King Live. interview http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/05/30/cheney.iraq/ (June 20, 2005) 2000s, 2005

Thinking, Time

“The critical ingredient is getting off your butt and doing something. It's as simple as that. A lot of people have ideas, but there are few who decide to do something about them now. Not tomorrow. Not next week. But today. The true entrepreneur is a doer, not a dreamer.”

Nolan Bushnell (1943) American entrepreneur

attributed in Entrepreneurship - In Cup of Tea, 2004-12-12 http://www.buzzle.com/editorials/12-10-2004-62751.asp,; and in Decision and Action http://www.topachievement.com/chuckgallozzi.html by Chuck Gallozzi, but also attributed to Robert Browning in On business, brands and marketplace success http://www.acleareye.com/sandbox_wisdom/2005/01/robert_browning.html.

People, Idea

“Now here is my point. Some of you may agree with me, and some of you may not, but in my view, it would be hard for anyone in this room today to make the case that the United States of America, our great country, a country which all of us love, it would be hard to make the case that we are a just society, or anything resembling a just society today.”

Bernie Sanders (1941) American politician, senator for Vermont

2010s, Liberty University Speech (14 September 2015)

Love, Country

“Europe could be Islamic by the end of the twenty-first century. … Will tourists in Paris in the year 2015 take a moment to visit the "mosque of Notre Dame" and the "Eiffel Minaret?" Through massive immigration and official dhimmitude from European leaders, Muslims are accomplishing today what they have failed to do at the time of the Crusaders: conquer Europe. If demographic trends continue, France, Holland, and other Western European nations could have Muslim majorities by middle of this century. … What Europe has long sown it is now reaping. In her book Eurabia, Bat Ye'or, the pioneering historian of dhimmitude, chronicles how this has come to pass. Europe, she explains, began thirty years ago to travel down a path of appeasement, accommodation, and cultural abdication in pursuit of shortsighted political and economic benefits. She observes that today, "Europe has evolved from a Judeo-Christian civilization, with important post-Enlightenment/secular elements, to a 'civilization of dhimmitude,' i. e., Eurabia: a secular-Muslim transitional society with its traditional Judeo-Christian mores rapidly disappearing." … France and Germany have pursued a different strategy, attempting to establish the European Union as a global counterweight of the United States—a strategy that involves close cooperation with the Arab League.”

Robert Spencer (1962) American author and blogger

The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam, 2005, ISBN 0-89526-013-1, pp. 221-224 http://books.google.com/books?id=_7RD2jwMU2wC&pg=PA221

Books, Travel, Time

“CREATIVITY first of all aims to achieve a REVOLUTION OF VALUES THROUGH RELIGION, therefore it completely and categorically rejects the Judeo-Christian-democratic-Marxist-liberal-feminist values of today and supplants them with new and basic values of which RACE IS THE FOUNDATION.”

Ben Klassen (1918–1993) American engineer, author and politician

The Essence of a Creator, essence 6
The Little White Book (1991)

Religion

“It is no accident that the Office of UN High Commissioner on Human Rights stated today that all circumstances of his (Gaddafi's) death must be investigated and I fully agree that such an investigation will be conducted.”

Sergey Lavrov (1950) Russian politician and Foreign Minister

Source: He said that Muammar Gaddafi's death should be investigated, as he shouldn't have been killed, (October 2011) http://rt.com/politics/lavrov-interview-russia-libya-us-439/

Death

“But during all the long years this matter has been discussed, advocated, refuted, the people themselves—poor people especially—were blindly, desperately practicing family limitation, just as they are practicing it today. To them birth control does not mean what it does to us. To them it has meant the most barbaric methods. It has meant the killing of babies—infanticide,—abortions,—in one crude way or another.”

Margaret Sanger (1879–1966) American birth control activist, educator and nurse

My Fight for Birth Control, 1931, page 133.

People, Family, Way, Birth

“At the base of her ankle is a deep, ugly scar she got when a car ran over her foot when she was six years old. That was in a small town in Bangladesh. Thus, even today, she hesitates superstitiously before crossing the road, and is painfully shy of walking distances. Her fears make her laughable. The scar is printed on her skin like a radiant star.”

Amit Chaudhuri (1962) contemporary Indian-English novelist

Afternoon Raag (1993)

Fear, Cars, Star

“Today’s great leaders will make sure they have all the important information, appropriate discussion, and reflection so that they can act decisively when time is of great importance.”

Don Soderquist (1934–2016)

Don Soderquist “ The Wal-Mart Way: The Inside Story of the Success of the World's Largest Company https://books.google.com/books?id=mIxwVLXdyjQC&lpg=PR9&dq=Don%20Soderquist&pg=PR9#v=onepage&q=Don%20Soderquist&f=false, Thomas Nelson, April 2005, p. 119. On Leading Well

Decision, Time

“While in England, I came across Sunday school material produced by a major Christian organization. Many conservative evangelical churches use it. One series of lessons covered the topic of origins. I was dismayed when the text declared that people need to believe in billions of years and evolution. But I was even more shocked when I read that the apostle Paul didn't understand science back in his time as we understand it today. Therefore, they concluded, what Paul wrote was not meant to answer questions about man's origins for today's world! What a low view of Scripture! They're looking on Paul's writings as the writings of a fallible human. But every word in the Bible was written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit - it's the Word of God who knows everything!”

Ken Ham (1951) Australian young Earth creationist

Did Eve really have an Extra Rib?: And other tough questions about the Bible (2002)

God, People, World, School

“I leave it to your discretion to strike or not, but the American colors must not be pulled down over my head today.”

Oliver Hazard Perry (1785–1819) United States Naval Officer

Final instructions to Lieutenant John Joliffe Yarnall, upon leaving the disabled Lawrence in the Battle of Lake Erie (10 September 1813)

Color

“God gives us humans everything we need to flourish, but he’s not the one who’s supposed to divvy up the loot... You want to see where Christ crucified abides today? Go to where the poor are suffering and fighting back, and that’s where He is.”

Paul Farmer (1959) American anthropologist

quoted on page 79.
Mountains Beyond Mountains

God, Suffering, Christ, Fight

“Today is fair. Tomorrow may be overcast with clouds. My words are like the stars that never change.”

Chief Seattle (1786–1866) Duwamish chief

Misattributed

Star, Change

“Five billion people could drown in Loch Ness, and no one would show above the surface. It is a big lake. […] As of the 1960s, there were over 9,000 sightings of the Loch Ness Monster. Today, there have been over 11,000 such sightings.”

Kent Hovind (1953) American young Earth creationist

Unmasking the False Religion of Evolution (1996)

People

“On reflection, moral judgment in the arts appears rather as a tribute to their power to influence emotion and possibly conduct. And reflecting further on what some critics do today, one sees that a good many have merely shifted the ground of their moralism, transferring their impulse of righteousness to politics and social issues.”

Jacques Barzun (1907–2012) Historian

"What Critics Are Good For" (1988), p. 69
The Culture We Deserve (1989)

Art, Appearance

“If I began today, I would certainly remember that by becoming a movie actress one automatically becomes vulnerable in the matter of gossip.”

Irene Dunne (1898–1990) American actress

If You Want Success (Screenland Interview) (1961)

“Captain Humayun Khan was a hero to our country and we should honor all who have made the ultimate sacrifice to keep our country safe. The real problem here are the radical Islamic terrorists who killed him, and the efforts of these radicals to enter our country to do us further harm. Given the state of the world today, we have to know everything about those looking to enter our country, and given the state of chaos in some of these countries, that is impossible. While I feel deeply for the loss of his son, Mr. Khan who has never met me, has no right to stand in front of millions of people and claim I have never read the Constitution, (which is false) and say many other inaccurate things. If I become President, I will make America safe again.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

2010s, 2016, July

People, World, Feeling, Problem

“Reporter: So, Gordon, in what areas do you think Middlesbrough were better than you today?
Strachan: What areas? Mainly that big green one out there…”

Gordon Strachan (1957) Scottish footballer and manager

Metro Article http://www.metro.co.uk/sport/football/756336-gordon-strachans-greatest-quotes 22nd October, 2009

Thinking

“Whereas we are tremendously proud of the accomplishments of the White Race throughout the span of history and civilization, we are not particularly proud of the cowardly and idiotic position the present generation has allowed itself to degenerate into. Nevertheless, the White Race is Nature's Elite, the highest living creature it has produced in all the eons of time. We CREATORS, being members of this Elite, are supremely interested in the welfare and the future for the White Race. We are interested in saving the White Race not so much for what it is today, but what its brilliant future potential can be if it will proceed on a deliberate program of up-breeding itself and improving its world. Our program and our creed are designed to promote those best interests of the White Race so that it can achieve the tremendous potential that is its true destiny. Therefore the heart of our creed is this: What is good for the White Race is the highest virtue; what is the bad for the White Race is the ultimate sin.”

Ben Klassen (1918–1993) American engineer, author and politician

White Man's Bible (1983)
White Man's Bible (1983)

World, History, Nature, Time

“So what’s happened since ’92, it’s where the administrations that changed quite dramatically, the foreign policy, and it was working more like pendulum, swinging from one side to the other. Clinton did very little, W did too much, Obama has been doing nothing. It sent a message – sent numerous messages across the world. While people knew in the 50s and 60s and 70s and 80s that America was there, America was consistent. Even if you have a change in the Oval Office, one party replaces another, you could rely on the United States. America was behind American allies. Today? It’s probably, it’s a springtime to be an American enemy because this administration gives up everything to the enemies and betrays allies. And going back to George W. administration, it’s very popular to criticize Bush today, Bush 43. Especially for the Iraq invasion, and I’ve heard many voices, even within the Republican Party, it’s just floating with the popular trend. First of all, I have to say as somebody who was born and raised in a Communist country, I cannot criticize any action that led to the destruction of dictatorship. I think his people had wrong expectations. When they saw the collapse of Saddam’s dictatorship after American invasion of Iraq and then the collapse of a few other dictatorships during the Arab Spring, they had expectations that next day, it would be a democracy. It’s wrong. It was very naive because dictators succeeds the staying in power for so many years, not because he’s a nice guy, just helps his people to get out of poverty, but because he’s brutal, he’s cruel. He succeeds in destroying opposition, first political opposition and then freedom of press and remaining horizontal ties in the society. All the NGOs, anything that could represent not just a threat to him, but it’s any sort of the slightest dissent. It’s kind of a political desert. What do you expect in a desert after 10, 20, 30 – in the case of Gaddafi, 42 years of dictatorship?”

Garry Kasparov (1963) former chess world champion

2010s, Interview with Bill Kristol (2016)

People, World, Guy, Democracy

“A lot of the reason I am here is because of my strength, my determination and character. I would just like to talk about a girl called Lucy.I went to her funeral today, she was 10 years old. She came to the game against Charlton where we lifted the Premiership trophy. She had a tumor on the brain - really she should have died the week before that game. But she was so desperate to come and see that game, to watch us play. The character and strength she showed made me put everything in perspective.I would like to dedicate this whole award to her, her family, especially her mother, and I would like to say thanks to everyone tonight.”

Frank Lampard (1978) English association football player

Sincerely yours, Frank (May 22, 2005)

Family, Girl, Game

“Painting, in the beginning, was a trade like any other. Some men became picture-makers as others became glaziers or carpenters. Painters painted shields, saddles and banners. The primitive painter was more of a craftsman than we are; he learned his trade superlatively well before he thought of letting himself go. The reverse is true today.”

Eugène Delacroix (1798–1863) French painter

13 January 1857 (p. 339)
1831 - 1863, Delacroix' 'Journal' (1847 – 1863)

Men, Learning, Painting

“Today, I use Linux as my primary OS (on an x86 PC, and on a Thinkpad), and I also use Irix (on an SGI O2). Linux has improved a great deal since I wrote this, specifically with respect to its ease of installation.”

Jamie Zawinski (1968) American programmer

In a comment http://www.jwz.org/doc/linux.html on his site in 2000

“Who are the real racists? So far, thanks to a Republican Party that is ignorant of its own history and gave up on the black community, Democrats have fifty of those two hundred years under their belt. The problem with today's Republican Party is that it has forgotten its own history and raison d'etre. Individual liberty. The party must come to realize that GOP also stands for 'Growth, Opportunity, Prosperity' and articulate how it stands, as its history and founding clearly demonstrate, for the individual pursuit of happiness as opposed to the progressive socialist Democrat lie of a collective guarantee of happiness. So, happy 160th birthday to my party, the Republican Party. I am a strong conservative and I hope Republicans recommit to those fundamental principles which established this party, the historical antithesis of the Democrats.”

Allen West (politician) (1961) American politician; retired United States Army officer

2010s, Voting Democratic for the next 200 years (2014)

Lie, Hope, History, Communication

“And so to those of you who may be vitalists I would make this prophecy: what everyone believed yesterday, and you believe today, only cranks will believe tomorrow.”

Francis Crick (1916–2004) British molecular biologist, biophysicist, neuroscientist; co-discoverer of the structure of DNA

Of Molecules and Men (1966)

“You of course appreciate that this industry of ours the automotive industry is today the greatest in the world. Three or four years ago it passed, in volume, steel and steel products, the next largest industry. This means, expressed otherwise, that upon its prosperity depends the prosperity of many millions of our citizens and the degree to which it has become stabilized in turn has a tremendous influence on the stabilization of industry as a whole, and therefore on the prosperity and happiness of still many more of our citizens. Directly and indirectly, this industry distributes hundreds of millions of dollars annually to those who are connected with it, in one way or another, as workers. It also distributes hundreds of millions of dollars in the aggregate to those who have invested in its securities. The purchasing power of this total aggregation, as you must appreciate, is tremendous.
I believe that if you questioned many of your readers as to the present position of the automotive industry, they would tell you that it is growing by leaps and bounds. I believe further you would sense uncertainty as to what is going to happen in the industry when the so-called state of saturation is reached. I do not know whether you appreciate it or not, but the industry has not grown very much during the past three or four years. It is practically stabilized at the present time.”

Alfred P. Sloan (1875–1966) American businessman

Source: Alfred P. Sloan in The Turning Wheel, 1934, p. 331-2: Speech by President Alfred P. Sloan, Jr., delivered to representatives of the automotive press at the Proving Ground on September 28, 1927.

World, Way, Question, Sense

“A friend came over to the house
a few days ago and read one of my poems.
He came back today and asked to read the
same poem over again. After he finished
reading it, he said, "It makes me want to write poetry."”

Richard Brautigan (1935–1984) American novelist, poet, and short story writer

"Hey! This Is What It's All About"
The Pill Versus the Springhill Mining Disaster

Reading, Housing

“One, two, three like a bird I sing, 'cause you given me the most beautiful set of wings.
I'm so glad you're here today, 'cause tomorrow I might have to go and fly away. Fly away, fly away, fly away, fly away.”

Tim McGraw (1967) American country singer

Last Dollar (Fly Away)
Song lyrics, Let It Go (2008)

Beauty, Bird, Singing, Flying

“Instead of insanity eliminating the crime according to the original meaning of article 64, every crime and even every offense now carries within it, as a legitimate suspicion, but also as a right that may be claimed, the hypothesis of insanity, in any case of anomaly. And the sentence that condemns or acquits is not simply a judgement of guily, a legal decision that lays down punishment; it bears within it an assessment of normality and a technical prescription for a possible normalization Today the judge- magistrate or juror0 certainly does more than 'judge”

Michel Foucault book Discipline and Punish

Source: Discipline and Punish (1977), pp. 20-21

Decision

“The Communist-Fascists, who are managers of the press, remove unwanted editors and monopolize the printing base, as it is widely practiced today in Belarus.”

Vasil Bykaŭ (1924–2003) Belarusian writer

“Ён Прыехаў, Сам Памёр, Усё Спакойна…” Апошнія Тыдні Васіля Быкава https://www.svaboda.org/amp/24853764.html // svaboda.org (in Belarusian)

“I worked as a volunteer at that session and heard Mahatma Gandhi for the first time. I was profoundly impressed by his personality. Mahatma Gandhi was explaining his weapon of non-violent struggle for securing w:SwarajSwaraj…. Mahatma Ganndhi told his young companions – May be you don’t agree today with what I say. But I am confident that within twenty five or thirty years, we will get Swaraj by this method. This purportedly proved true and just 31 years later India became independent.”

Morarji Desai (1896–1995) Former Indian Finance Minister, Freedom Fighters, Former prime minister

As quoted in Commissions and Omissions by Indian Prime Ministers (1996) by Janak Raj Jai, Volume 1, p. 210

Confidence, Time, Personality

“Today too, the most important issue in the world is Palestine. If a war breaks out in Iraq, we believe it is due to the provocation of the Zionists. If it happens in Afghanistan, it is because of their provocation. If Sudan is oppressed, it is due to Zionist seduction. We consider all the arrogant, colonialist schemes to be inspired by the Zionists.”

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

September 18, 2009. http://www.memritv.org/clip_transcript/en/2247.htm 2009

War, World

“What a great man. There are so many people today walking around alive because of him, not only in Vietnam, but people who kept their units under control under other circumstances because they had heard his story. We may never know just how many lives he saved.”

Hugh Thompson, Jr. (1943–2006) United States helicopter pilot during the Vietnam War

http://www.nola.com/newsflash/louisiana/index.ssf?/base/news-22/1136568553158920.xml&storylist=louisiana
Col. Tom Kolditz, head of the Army academy's behavioral sciences and leadership department.
Quotes of others about Thompson

People

“Today I visited Van Gogh's exhibition. I can not help it, but I think it's art for Eskimos, I can not enjoy it. I find it fairly crude and obnoxious, without the slightest distinction, and besides that everything is stolen from Millet and others.”

George Hendrik Breitner (1857–1923) Dutch painter and photographer

translation from the original Dutch, Fons Heijnsbroek version in original Dutch (citaat van Breitner's brief, in het Nederlands:) Vandaag ben ik op de expositie van Van Gogh geweest. Ik kan het niet helpen, maar ik vind het kunst voor Eskimo's, ik kan er niet van genieten. Ik vind het eerlijk grof en onhebbelijk, zonder de minste distinctie, en buitendien alles nog een gestolen goedje van Millet en anderen. Breitner's quote in his letter to Mrs. Van der Weele, (nr. 36) 25 Dec. 1892; as cited by P.H. Hefting, 'Brieven van G.H. Breitner aan H.J. van der Weele' https://dspace.library.uu.nl/handle/1874/245951, in Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek 27 1976, pp. 112-172 Breitner wrote his letter after visiting the large Van Gogh-exhibition in the Panorama Room, December 1892 1890 - 1900

Art, Thinking, Help

“Today we know not only that there is a terrible amount of disorder in the heavens — great catastrophes or conflagrations occur frequently — but evolution gives us a perfectly natural explanation of such order as there is. No distinguished astronomer now traces "the finger of God" in the heavens; and astronomers ought to know best.”

Joseph McCabe (1867–1955) British writer

The Story of Religious Controversy http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/joseph_mccabe/religious_controversy/ (1929), p. 86.

God, Nature

“Violence is a fact of life in today’s society and therefore it has its place in books and films, but I strongly believe that the people who create those books and films have a duty to treat the subject seriously and to show the terrible consequences.”

Lois Duncan (1934–2016) American young-adult and children's writer

On violence in the arts, 1998 interview, reprinted in The Telegraph http://www.telegraph.co.uk/obituaries/2016/08/25/lois-duncan-author-of-teenage-fiction--obituary/ (2016) 1990–2002

Life, People, Books

“Had the foreign legations being subjected to the full force of bombardment, would those buildings still be intact today? (Original Chinese:設使火轟水灌，豈能一律保全？)”

Empress Dowager Cixi (1835–1908) Chinese empress

“I became aware of something today when I was with Fräulein Weshoff [German woman-sculptor, who married later the poet Rilke ]. I should like to have her as a friend. She is grand and splendid to look at – and that's the way she is as a person and as an artist. Today we raced down the hill on our little sleds. It was such fun.”

Paula Modersohn-Becker (1876–1907) German artist

excerpt of her Journal, Worpswede 1897; as quoted in Voicing our visions, – Writings by women artists; ed. Mara R. Witzling, Universe New York, 1991, p. 194
1897

Way, Personality

“If today he descended from Heaven, the great warrior who struck the moneychangers. You would once again shout crucify! And nail him to the cross that he himself carried. But he would gently laugh at your hatred. The truth remains even when your bearers are passed. Faith remains, because I give my life… And the fighter of all the world towers on the cross.”

Baldur von Schirach (1907–1974) German Nazi leader convicted of crimes against humanity in the Nuremberg trial

About Christ, Evangelium im Dritten Reich, July 1, 1934. Quoted in "The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919-1945" by Richard Steigmann-Gall - Religion - 2003

Life, Truth, World, Faith

“What I have achieved has been largely a matter of chance. Many problems I thought about at length with no success. With other problems, there was the inspiration—indeed, some that astound me today. Certainly the best times were when I was alone with mathematics, free of ambition and of pretense, and indifferent to the world.”

Robert Langlands (1936) Canadian mathematician

Source: "Mathematical retrospections," 2013, p. 142

World, Mathematics, Problem, Chance

“Politics is stuck in America today. We need to break through the stale debates and self-serving non-solutions that are coming from both political parties, and we need to do it without ending up at the "mushy middle," where there's no direction or principle. That's where the radical middle comes in. The radical middle is an attempt to break out of that stuckness in a fresh and principled way. It consists of everyone who's bold and yet savvy enough to want idealism without illusions – a fresh and hopeful vision that doesn't fall into the trap, as many leftists do, of looking back to chestnuts from the counter-culture of the Sixties and Seventies….”

Mark Satin (1946) American political theorist, author, and newsletter publisher

Source: Radical Middle (2004), Chapter 1, "A Creative and Practical Politics," p. 5.

Hope, Way

“Scientific "facts" are taught at a very early age and in the very same manner in which religious "facts" were taught only a century ago. There is no attempt to waken the critical abilities of the pupil so that he may be able to see things in perspective. At the universities the situation is even worse, for indoctrination is here carried out in a much more systematic manner. Criticism is not entirely absent. Society, for example, and its institutions, are criticised most severely and often most unfairly… But science is excepted from the criticism. In society at large the judgment of the scientist is received with the same reverence as the judgement of bishops and cardinals was accepted not too long ago. The move towards "demythologization," for example, is largely motivated by the wish to avoid any clash between Christianity and scientific ideas. If such a clash occurs, then science is certainly right and Christianity wrong. Pursue this investigation further and you will see that science has now become as oppressive as the ideologies it had once to fight. Do not be misled by the fact that today hardly anyone gets killed for joining a scientific heresy. This has nothing to do with science. It has something to do with the general quality of our civilization. Heretics in science are still made to suffer from the most severe sanctions this relatively tolerant civilization has to offer.”

Paul Karl Feyerabend (1924–1994) Austrian-born philosopher of science

How To Defend Society Against Science (1975)

Age, Motivation, Idea, Suffering

“Far from there being a constant flow of resources and aid from northern countries to southern countries, the opposite is the case, and has been for most of the past 200 years. Colonialism was not about exporting civilisations; it was not about improving the lot of people in the poorest countries—it was driven by greed and avarice and a determination to control other people's lives. It was about ensuring that the work, the raw materials and the food of the poorer countries flowed out to the richest parts of the world. That is the legacy of colonialism and imperialism that we have to deal with today. I honestly believe that the role of the world's twin financial institutions, the International Monetary Fund and the World bank, is essentially to reassert that old-world order so that once more a minority of northern, predominantly rich countries dominate the majority of southern, predominantly poor countries.”

Jeremy Corbyn (1949) British Labour Party politician

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1990/dec/14/overseas-development in the House of Commons (14 December 1990). 1990s

People, World, Food, Past

“The scientific sterility of the Middle Ages has to be condemned for the same reasons which make it necessary today to condemn the philosophic sterility of scientism.”

Étienne Gilson (1884–1978) French historian and philosopher

Methodical Realism

Age

“You have spoken much today of my self-sacrifice and devotion to my country. I have heard that kind of speech ever since I came out of jail, but I hear it with embarrassment, with something of pain. For I know my weakness, I am a prey to my own faults and backslidings. I was not blind to them before and when they all rose up against me in seclusion, I felt them utterly. I knew them that I the man was a man of weakness, a faulty and imperfect instrument, strong only when a higher strength entered into me. Then I found myself among these young men and in many of them I discovered a mighty courage, a power of self-effacement in comparison with which I was simply nothing. I saw one or two who were not only superior to me in force and character, - very many were that, — but in the promise of that intellectual ability on which I prided myself.”

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

The Uttarpara Address (1909)

Men, Pain, Courage, Strong

“Is democracy in crisis? This question is being posed with increasing urgency by some of the leading statesmen of the West, by columnists and scholars, and— if public opinion polls are to be trusted— even by the publics. In some respects, the mood of today is reminiscent of that of the early twenties, when the views of Oswald Spengler regarding "The Decline of the West" were highly popular. This pessimism is echoed, with obvious Schadenfreude, by various communist observers, who speak with growing confidence of "the general crisis of capitalism" and who see in it the confirmation of their own theories.”

Michel Crozier book The Crisis of Democracy

Source: The Crisis of Democracy, 1975, p. 4: Introduction note

Democracy, Confidence, Mood, Question

“It’s important to understand how we got where we are today. In 1966, the unthinkable happened: a madman climbed the University of Texas clock tower and opened fire, killing more than a dozen people. It was the first mass shooting in the age of television, and it left a real impression on the country. It was the kind of terror we didn’t expect to ever see again. But around 30 years ago, we started to see an uptick in these types of shootings, and over the last decade they’ve become the new norm.
In July 2012, a gunman walked into a darkened theater in Aurora and shot 12 people to death, injuring 70 more. One of his weapons was an assault rifle. The sudden and utterly random violence was a terrifying sign of what was to come.
In December 2012, a young man entered an elementary school in Newtown and murdered six educators and 20 young children. One of his weapons was an assault rifle. Watching the aftermath of these young babies being gunned down was heartrending.
In June 2016, a gunman entered a nightclub in Orlando and sprayed revelers with gunfire. The shooter fired hundreds of rounds, many in close proximity, and killed 49. Many of the victims were shot in the head at close range. One of his weapons was an assault rifle.
Last month, a gunman opened fire on concertgoers in Las Vegas, turning an evening of music into a killing field. All told, the shooter used multiple assault rifles fitted with bump-fire stocks to kill 58 people. The concert venue looked like a warzone.
Over the weekend in Sutherland Springs, 26 were killed by a gunman with an assault rifle. The dead ranged from 17 months old to 77 years. No one is spared with these weapons of war. When so many rounds are fired so quickly, no one is spared. Another community devastated and dozens of families left to pick up the pieces.
These are just a few of the many communities we talk about in hushed tones—San Bernardino, Littleton, Aurora, towns and cities across the country that have been permanently scarred.”

Dianne Feinstein (1933) American politician

[Senators Introduce Assault Weapons Ban, November 8, 2017, w:Diane Feinstein, Diane, Feinstein, https://www.feinstein.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2017/11/senators-introduce-assault-weapons-ban]
On the introduction of the Assault Weapons Ban of 2017

Death, War, Children, People

“Surrealism will at least have served to give experimental proof that total sterility and attempts at automatizations have gone too far and have led to a totalitarian system... Today's laziness and the total lack of technique have reached their paroxysm in the psychological signification of the current use of the college”

Salvador Dalí (1904–1989) Spanish artist

= collage
Quote from the catalog, 1943, of Dali's exhibition at the Knoedler Gallery in New York; as quoted on Wikipedia: Salvador Dali
Dali attacked here some frequently-used Surrealist techniques
Quotes of Salvador Dali, 1941 - 1950

“How can one be late to the end of history? A question for today. It is serious because it obliges one to reflect again, as we have been doing since Hegel, on what happens and deserves the name of event, after history; it obliges one to wonder if the end of history is but the end of a certain concept of history.”

Jacques Derrida book Specters of Marx

Injunctions of Marx
Specters of Marx (1993)

History, Question

“America is today without the necessary information upon which to proceed intelligently. Much of the propaganda essential to winning the war has made the ground look like a battlefield after a tank has passed over it ploughed deep but unfit for culture for some time to come. Nowhere is there a clear authoritative statement of the contribution of the various races as such to America. Nowhere is there, an analysis of what they have brought or can bring, and of all that material which we have not used. Nowhere is there information as to what they take or of what they want most from America. Tons of literature are printed and sent out daily by all kinds of agencies, with seldom a consultation with the foreigner as to how it fits the needs of his race. We ignore in most racial meetings the knowledge which is there outlined, and violate very nearly every sound principle of race psychology. We get as a result the minds of the newcomers but not their hearts; their respectful attention but not their conversion. We get their cash contributions for American war activities and charities, but we do not succeed in creating in them the desire to stay here permanently.”

Frances Kellor (1873–1952) American sociologist

What is Americanization? (1919)

War, Intelligence, Literature, Knowledge

“In the 21st century, nations cannot; and we cannot allow them to redraw borders by force. These are the ground rules. And if we fail to uphold them, we will rue the day. Russia has violated these ground rules and continues to violate them. Today Russia is occupying sovereign Ukrainian territory. Let me be crystal clear: The United States does not, will not, never will recognize Russia’s attempt to annex the Crimea. (Applause.) It’s that saying -- that simple. There is no justification.”

Joe Biden (1942) 47th Vice President of the United States (in office from 2009 to 2017)

Remarks by Vice President Joe Biden to The Ukrainian Rada https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2015/12/09/remarks-vice-president-joe-biden-ukrainian-rada (9 December 2015). 2010s

“I was also upset to hear of a black conservative in Virginia named Jay Parker. How could a black man call himself a conservative? In a twist of fate, they both are dear friends today, and the youthful wrath I visited upon them is now being visited upon me, though without the youth. What goes around does indeed come around.”

Clarence Thomas (1948) Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

1990s, I Am a Man, a Black Man, an American (1998)

Fate, Youth

“He was dizzy, and it occurred to him that Newton must have been right when he’d said that light consisted of particles, for today he could feel them hitting him.”

Tim Powers book The Stress of Her Regard

Source: The Stress of Her Regard (1989), Chapter 3 (p. 51)

Feeling, Light

“Now therefore I, Al-Sultan Almu'tasimu Billahi Muhibbuddin Tuanku Alhaj Sultan Abdul Halim Mu’azam Shah ibni Almarhum Sultan Badlishah, with this proclaim that I today had held the postition of the Yang di-Pertuan Agong and had took oath required by Article 37 of the Federal Constitution with the step prescribed by the Article.”

Abdul Halim of Kedah (1927–2017) King of Malaysia

Proclamation as the 14th Yang di-Pertuan Agong https://books.google.com.my/books?id=P3ZODwAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false, 13/12/2011

“Today, there is a contest between Trumpism and Republicanism. Through the calculated statements of its leader, Trumpism has become associated with racism, misogyny, bigotry, xenophobia, vulgarity and, most recently, threats and violence. I am repulsed by each and every one of these.”

Mitt Romney (1947) American businessman and politician

Facebook, March 18, 2016 https://www.facebook.com/mittromney/posts/10153370698696121 2016

“The historical Muhammad was the savage leader of a gang of robbers from Medina. Without scruples they looted, raped and murdered. The sources describe orgies of savagery where hundreds of people’s throats were cut, hands and feet chopped off, eyes cut out, entire tribes massacred. An example is the extinction of the jewish Kurayza tribe in Medina in 627. One of those who chopped off their heads was Muhammad. The women and children were sold as slaves. Confronted with the lunacy of Islamic terrorists today, it is not hard to find out where the lunacy comes from.”

Geert Wilders (1963) Dutch politician

"Time To Unmask Muhammad", The Brussels Journal (30 March 2011) http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/4714 2010s

Women, Children, People

“As a Nobel Prize winner I cannot but regret that the award was never given to Mark Twain, nor to Henry James, speaking only of my own countrymen. Greater writers than these also did not receive the prize. I would have been happy — happier — today if the prize had been given to that beautiful writer Isak Dinesen.”

Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) American author and journalist

As quoted in The New York Times Book Review (7 November 1954)

Beauty, Happiness

“Reporter: President Jiang, do you think it’ll be good for Mr. Tung to serve another consecutive term?
Jiang: That’ll be good!
Reporter: Does Central Government support him too?
Jiang: Of course yes!
Reporter: Recently European Union has published a report saying that Beijing will affect and influence the nomocracy of Hong Kong in some ways. What's your response to that?
Jiang: Never heard before.
Reporter: It’s Chris Patten who said that.
Jiang: You the media should always remember that Seeing is believing. You should judge by yourself after you have received the news, got it? In case you say these things out of thin air for him, you may share the responsibility in some way.
Reporter: Now in such an early time, you said that you supported Mr. Tung, will that give people the impression that there is already an internal decision or imperial appointment on Mr. Tung?
Jiang: There's no such implication whatsoever. Everything should be done in accordance with Hong Kong Basic Law and the election laws.
Reporter: But…
Jiang: Replying what you've just asked me, I could have said "No comment." But you guys wouldn't be happy. So what should I do?
Reporter: Then Mr. Tung…
Jiang: I did not say that imperially appointing him to serve the next term. You asked me whether I support him or not, I support him. I can tell you explicitly.
Reporter: President Jiang…
Jiang: You all… My feeling is that you the media need to learn more. You are very familiar with the Western set of value, but after all you are too young. Do you understand what I mean? Let me tell you, I've been through hundreds of battles. I've seen a lot. Which country in the West have I not been to? Every time… You should know Mike Wallace in the US. He's way above you all. He and I talked cheerfully and humorously, which is why the media need to raise your intellectual level. Got it or not?
Reporter: President Jiang…
Jiang: I'm anxious for you all truly. You really… I… You guys are good at one thing. Wherever you go to all over the world, you always run faster than Western journalists. But the questions you keep asking - are too simple, sometimes naive. Understand or not? Got it or not?
Reporter: But could you say why you support Tung Chee-hwa?
Jiang: I'm very sorry. Today I am speaking to you as an elder, not as a journalist. I am not a journalist. But I've seen too much. I have this necessity to tell you a bit of my life experience.
Jiang: I just wanted to… Every time… In Chinese we have saying, "Make a fortune quietly." If I had said nothing, that would have been the best. But I thought I've seen all of you so enthusiastic. If I said nothing, that wouldn't be good. So, a moment ago you just insisted… In spreading the news, if your reports are inaccurate, you must be responsible. I did not say giving an imperial appointment. No such meaning. But you insisted on asking me whether I supported Mr. Tung or not. He is still the current Chief Executive. How could we not support the Chief Executive?
Reporter: But if we talk about his serving another term…
Jiang: To serve another term, you must follow the law of Hong Kong. Of course, our right to make the decision is also very important, since the Hong Kong SAR belongs to the Central Government of the People's Republic of China. When it gets to the right time, we'll let you know our decision. Understand what I say? You all. Don't provoke an uproar. Don't make it a flash-news saying that "It has already been imperially appointed" and criticize me. You all! Naive! I'm angry! I just offend you today! Your behavior like this is annoying!”

Jiang Zemin (1926) former General Secretary of the Communist Party of China

As quoted in "Former president Jiang Zemin unleashes a long tirade after a Hong Kong reporter asks him if Beijing had issued an "imperial order" to support Tung Chee-hwa in his bid to seek a second term as Chief Executive" https://www.facebook.com/shanghaiist/videos/10152728897091030 (October 2014), Facebook. 2000s, Hong Kong reporters make Jiang see red

Life, People, World, Law

“Chesterton and Tolkien and Lewis were, as I’ve said, not the only writers I read between the ages of six and thirteen, but they were the authors I read over and over again; each of them played a part in building me. Without them, I cannot imagine that I would have become a writer, and certainly not a writer of fantastic fiction. I would not have understood that the best way to show people true things is from a direction that they had not imagined the truth coming, nor that the majesty and the magic of belief and dreams could be a vital part of life and of writing.
And without those three writers, I would not be here today. And nor, of course, would any of you. I thank you.”

Neil Gaiman (1960) English fantasy writer

"Mythcon 35 Guest of Honor Speech", in Mythprint (October 2004)

Life, People, Truth, Age

Quotes about today page 17

Quotes about today
page 17