Great quote(s) for the times we're in .........

Danang Sailor said:

If you're a fan of R.A.H. you'll also enjoy the writings of Anson MacDonald and Caleb Saunders!



(Yes, I know.)

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Check out John Ringo, especially 'The Last Centurion'.

"I have little interest in streamlining government or in making it more efficient, for I mean to reduce its size. I do not undertake to promote welfare, for I propose to extend freedom. My aim is not to pass laws, but to repeal them. It is not to inaugurate new programs, but to cancel old ones that do violence to the Constitution ... or have failed their purpose ... or that impose on the people an unwarranted financial burden. I will not attempt to discover whether legislation is 'needed' before I have first determined whether it is constitutionally permissible. And if I should be attacked for neglecting my constituents' 'interests,' I shall reply that I was informed that their main interest is liberty, and in that cause I am doing the very best I can."

--- Barry M. Goldwater

I have often wondered what the country would be like today if he had been elected.

Here's to the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes... the ones who see things differently -- they're not fond of rules... You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them, but the only thing you can't do is ignore them because they change things... they push the human race forward, and while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius, because the ones who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do. ~Steve Jobs

If the people of the nation understood our banking and monetary system, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning ~ Henry Ford

“Wall Street didn’t write those failed policies, Wall Street didn’t spend a trillion dollars.” “Wall Street isn’t asking to spend another $450 billion. It didn’t work with a trillion. It’s not gonna’ work with $450 billion. You can demonstrate all you want on Wall Street. The problem is 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue!”- Mr. Herman Cain

“We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security.” -Dwight D. Eisenhower

"End up with the right regrets."
.Arthur Miller

The truly educated become conscious. They become self-aware. They do not lie to themselves. They do not pretend that fraud is moral or that corporate greed is good. They do not claim that the demands of the marketplace can morally justify the hunger of children or denial of medical care to the sick. They do not throw 6 million families from their homes as the cost of doing business. Thought is a dialogue with one’s inner self. Those who think ask questions, questions those in authority do not want asked. They remember who we are, where we come from and where we should go. They remain eternally skeptical and distrustful of power. And they know that this moral independence is the only protection from the radical evil that results from collective unconsciousness. The capacity to think is the only bulwark against any centralized authority that seeks to impose mindless obedience.~Chris Hedges

"A public man has no right to let his actions be determined by particular interests. He does the same thing as a judge who accepts a bribe. Like a judge he must consider what is right, not what is advantageous to a party or class...There is not a more perilous or immoral habit of mind than the sanctifying of success.”

John Dalberg Lord Acton

“A culture that does not grasp the vital interplay between morality and power, which mistakes management techniques for wisdom, and fails to understand that the measure of a civilization is its compassion, not its speed or ability to consume, condemns itself to death.” Chris Hedges

CityGirl said:

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Gawd I think of Pelosi when I read that.

CityGirl, do you think Nancy might suffer from a bit of do-gooditis? I know the woman seriously believes that she does good for the people, to the point of "we have to pass it to know what's in it". In fact Ted Kennedy (rest his soul) and a number of the hard core lefties might have suffered in quiet in harmony from the same malady. The moderate lefties, not so much. We could list Republicans that are just plain evil, but might be instructional in a non-pejorative way to list the living that are dangerously over-the-top altruistic:

1. Barney Frank
2. Maxine Waters
3. Barbara Boxer
4. ....

"No one's ever asked to see my birth certificate"- Mitt Romney

+1 Lollie!

"Everything popular is wrong" - Oscar Wilde

"Consider the following. We humans are social beings. We come into the world as the result of others' actions. We survive here in dependence on others. Whether we like it or not, there is hardly a moment of our lives when we do not benefit from others' activities. For this reason it is hardly surprising that most of our happiness arises in the context of our relationships with others.

Nor is it so remarkable that our greatest joy should come when we are motivated by concern for others. But that is not all. We find that not only do altruistic actions bring about happiness but they also lessen our experience of suffering. Here I am not suggesting that the individual whose actions are motivated by the wish to bring others' happiness necessarily meets with less misfortune than the one who does not. Sickness, old age, mishaps of one sort or another are the same for us all. But the sufferings which undermine our internal peace- anxiety, doubt, disappointment- these things are definitely less. In our concern for others, we worry less about ourselves. When we worry less about ourselves an experience of our own suffering is less intense.

What does this tell us? Firstly, because our every action has a universal dimension, a potential impact on others' happiness, ethics are necessary as a means to ensure that we do not harm others. Secondly, it tells us that genuine happiness consists in those spiritual qualities of love, compassion, patience, tolerance and forgiveness and so on. For it is these which provide both for our happiness and others' happiness. A good motivation is what is needed: compassion without dogmatism, without complicated philosophy; just understanding that others are human brothers and sisters and respecting their human rights and dignities. That we humans can help each other is one of our unique human capacities"

Politics is not the art of the possible. It consists in choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable. ~John Kenneth Galbraith

Bullshitters, unlike liars, do not deliberately make false claims about what is true. In fact, bullshit need not be untrue at all. Rather, bullshitters convey a favorable impression of themselves while remaining casually indifferent about whether what they say is true. They quietly change the rules governing their end of the conversation so that claims about truth and falsity are irrelevant.
~Harry G. Frankfurt

Elections belong to the people. It's their decision. If they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their behinds, then they will just have to sit on their blisters- Honest Abe

CityGirl said:

Bullshitters, unlike liars, do not deliberately make false claims about what is true. In fact, bullshit need not be untrue at all. Rather, bullshitters convey a favorable impression of themselves while remaining casually indifferent about whether what they say is true. They quietly change the rules governing their end of the conversation so that claims about truth and falsity are irrelevant.
~Harry G. Frankfurt

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Perhaps this explains why Obama's words and actions are so different?

Obama’s desperate flailing about to justify four more years has sunk into such unhinged smarminess that Romney may have concluded: There is nothing Obama won’t say about me, because he has nothing to say for himself, so I will chose a running mate whose seriousness about large problems and ideas underscores what the president has become — silly and small. - George Will

"Political parties exist to secure responsible government and to execute the will of the people. From these great tasks both of the old parties have turned aside. Instead of instruments to promote the general welfare they have become the tools of corrupt interests, which use them impartially to serve their selfish purposes. Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to dissolve the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics, is the first task of the statesmanship of the day."~TR

"The founders did not anticipate the neccesity of political parties. However, Madison quickly came to think that parties could moderate factions by channeling and disiplining them. Campaign finance reformers (sic McCain) are always unpleasantly surprised by the unintended consequences of their "reforms." Were they to suceed in banningsoft money, they would be startled by and utteuly predictable result of the hydraulics of political money. money banned from theparties would flow insted toother- often wilder-factions"

George F Will
March 2001


And so, just 7 yeas later, McCain lost

"... This is the man America needs. This is the man who will wake up every day with the determination to solve the problems that others say can't be solved, to fix what others say is beyond repair. This is the man who will work harder than anyone so that we can work a little less hard. I can't tell you what will happen over the next four years. But I can only stand here tonight, as a wife, a mother, a grandmother, an American, and make you this solemn commitment: This man will not fail. This man will not let us down. This man will lift up America!"- Ann Romney, future first lady