Crush The Bourgeoisie

The way to crush the bourgeoisie is to grind them between the millstones of taxation and inflation.

-- Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

Quotations

I might repeat to myself slowly and soothingly, a list of quotations beautiful from minds profound -- if I can remember any of the damn things.

-- Dorothy Parker (1893-1967), American writer of poems and short stories

RIP William F. Buckley, Jr.

I get satisfaction of three kinds. One is creating something, one is being paid for it, and one is the feeling that I haven't just been sitting on my ass all afternoon.

-- William F. Buckley, Jr. (November 24, 1925 - February 27, 2008), American author and conservative commentator

Price We Pay For Money

The price we pay for money is paid in liberty.

-- Robert Louis Stevenson, novelist, essayist, and poet (1850-1894)

Vulgar And Prurient And Dumb

TV is not vulgar and prurient and dumb because the people who compose the audience are vulgar and dumb. Television is the way it is simply because people tend to be extremely similar in their vulgar and prurient and dumb interests and wildly different in their refined and aesthetic and noble
interests.

-- David Foster Wallace, from his essay "E Pluribus Unum", cited in Ubiquity, "End Laptop Serfdom", Espen Andersen, 5 Feb 2008

Few Men

Few men have virtue to withstand the highest bidder.

-- George Washington (22 February 1732 - 14 December 1799), first President of the US

Disturbed

Rule #1: Disturbed and/or violent individuals will continue to risk their own lives in ways that risk public lives, sometimes many more than we expect.

Rule #2: People cannot change Rule #1.

All we can do is mitigate the effects as much as we can.

-- Comment at http://www.schneier.com/blog/, by clvrmnky, February 20, 2008 08:29 AM

Ancient Egypt

It's too bad Cuba isn't ancient Egypt where the kings were sometimes buried with their full retinue.

-- NPR commentator Andrei Codrescu on the ceding of power by Cuban leder Fidel Castro to his brother Raul, 19 February 2008

Bill Of Rights

... The Bill of Rights is a literal and absolute document. The First Amendment doesn't say you have a right to speak out unless the government has a "compelling interest" in censoring the Internet. The Second Amendment doesn't say you have the right to keep and bear arms until some madman plants a bomb. The Fourth Amendment doesn't say you have the right to be secure from search and seizure unless some FBI agent thinks you fit the profile of a terrorist. The government has no right to interfere with any of these freedoms under any circumstances.

-- Harry Browne (1933-2006) author, two-time presidential candidate, co-founder of Downsize DC

Is It Obvious?

Is it really so easy to determine that smacking someone in the face to find out where he has hidden the bomb that is about to blow up Los Angeles is prohibited by the Constitution?

Is it obvious, that what can't be done for punishment can't be done to exact information that is crucial to the society? I think it's not at all an easy question, to tell you the truth.

-- Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, interview on BBC Radio, 12 February 2008

Hard To Believe

It's hard to believe you, sir. I hate to say that because you're one of my heroes, but it's hard to believe you.

-- Rep. Elijah E. Cummings, to Roger Clemens after his testimony before a Congressional panel

No Map

You're asking me to tell you how we're going to get to a place we've never been, with a map I don't have.

-- Col. Steven David, military defense lawyer, when asked for details on the capital case against 6 Guantanamo detainees, NY Times, 12 February 2008

Those Who Deny Freedom

Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, can not long retain it.

-- Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865), 16th US President, "The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln" edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume III, "Letter To Henry L. Pierce and Others" (April 6, 1859), p. 376.

A Foolish Consistency

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Speak what you think today in hard words, and tomorrow speak what tomorrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said today.

-- Ralph Waldo Emerson, American essayist and poet, "Self-Reliance", 1841

To Set A Limit

The aim of science is not to open the door to infinite wisdom, but to set a limit to infinite error.

-- Bertolt Brecht (10 Feb 1898 - 14 Aug 1956), German socialist dramatist, stage director, and poet, in "Science"

Fear Of Freedom

The fear of freedom is strong in us. We call it chaos or anarchy, and the words are threatening. We live in a true chaos of contradicting authorities, an age of conformism without community, of proximity without communication. We could only fear chaos if we imagined that it was unknown to us, but in fact we know it very well.

-- Germaine Greer (January 29, 1939-) Australian academic, writer, broadcaster, and feminist

Silly

Silly is you in a natural state, and serious is something you have to do until you can get silly again.

-- Mike Myers

History We Make Today

We want to live in the present, and the only history that is worth a tinker's damn is the history we make today.

-- Henry Ford (1863-1947), American Industrialist, Founder of Ford Motor Company

How It Gets Done

I thought it was pretty good, but athletes don't think about history when making history. They think about what they're doing, and that's how it gets done.

-- Nadia Comaneci, the Romanian gymnast, on the routine that won her a perfect score at the 1976 Olympics, New York Times, 3 February 2008