Popular Delusion

It is a popular delusion that the government wastes vast amounts of money through inefficiency and sloth.  Enormous effort and elaborate planning are required to waste this much money.

-- Patrick Jake (P.J.) O'Rourke (1947-), American political satirist, Parliament of Whores (1991), p 36

What A Nut

We are on the cusp of this time where I can say, "I speak as a citizen of the world" without others saying, "God, what a nut."

-- Lawrence Lessig (1961-), American professor and political activist, "One Planet, One Net" symposium, 10 October 1998

Star That Guides Us Still

We, the people, declare today that the most evident of truths -- that all of us are created equal -- is the star that guides us still; just as it guided our forebears through Seneca Falls and Selma and Stonewall; just as it guided all those men and women, sung and unsung, who left footprints along this great Mall, to hear a preacher say that we cannot walk alone; to hear a King proclaim that our individual freedom is inextricably bound to the freedom of every soul on Earth.

-- Barack Hussein Obama II (4 August 1961-), 44th President of the United States, Second Inaugural Address, Washington D.C. (21 January 2013)

A Revolver

Here is a revolver.
It has an amazing language all its own.
It delivers unmistakable ultimatums.
It is the last word.
A simple, little human forefinger can tell a terrible story with it.
Hunger, fear, revenge, robbery, hide behind it.
It is the claw of the jungle made quick and powerful.
It is the club of the savage turned to magnificent precision.
It is more rapid than any judge or court of law.
It is less subtle and treacherous than any one lawyer or ten.

When it has spoken, the case can not be appealed to the supreme
    court, nor any mandamus nor any injunction nor any stay of
    execution come in and interfere with the original purpose.
And nothing in human philosophy persists more strangely than the
    old belief that God is always on the side of those who have the
    most revolvers.

-- Carl Sandburg, A Revolver, unpublished, found in University of Illinois archives, January 2013

Big Fake

Luke's name is Armstrong and people know that name, and when he goes to school I don't want them to say, "Oh yeah, your dad's the big fake, the doper." That would just kill me.

-- Lance Armstrong, in his second autobiography, "Every Second Counts" (2003)

Roe V. Wade

State criminal abortion laws, like those involved here, that except from criminality only a life-saving procedure on the mother's behalf without regard to the stage of her pregnancy and other interests involved violate the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which protects against state action the right to privacy, including a woman's qualified right to terminate her pregnancy.  Though the State cannot override that right, it has legitimate interests in protecting both the pregnant woman's health and the potentiality of human life, each of which interests grows and reaches a "compelling" point at various stages of the woman's approach to term.

-- Supreme Court of the United States, ruling in 410 U.S. 113 - Roe v. Wade, 22 January 1973

Unarmed Truth

I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality.  That is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.

-- Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968), Baptist minister and civil rights activist, Nobel Prize acceptance speech, Oslo, 10 December 1964

Scale Of Dollars

A host of positive psychological changes inevitably will result from widespread economic security. The dignity of the individual will flourish when the decisions concerning his life are in his own hands, when he has the means to seek self-improvement. Personal conflicts among husbands, wives and children will diminish when the unjust measurement of human worth on the scale of dollars is eliminated.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968), Baptist minister, civil rights activist, Nobel laureate, Address to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 16 August 1967

Half-Baked

The tough mind is sharp and penetrating, breaking through the crust of legends and myths and sifting the true from the false.  The tough-minded individual is astute and discerning.  He has a strong austere quality that makes for firmness of purpose and solidness of commitment.

Who doubts that this toughness is one of man's greatest needs?  Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking.  There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions.  Nothing pains some people more than having to think.

-- Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (15 January 1929 - 4 April 1968), Baptist minister, civil rights activist, and Nobel laureate, Strength to Love (1963), Chapter 1

Up To You

A lot of people are waiting for Martin Luther King or Mahatma Gandhi to come back -- but they are gone.  We are it.  It is up to us.  It is up to you.

-- Marian Wright Edelman (1939-), Children's Defense Fund founder, as quoted in The Art of Winning Commitment (2004) by Dick Richards

Curator

I think Alfred Nobel would know what I mean when I say that I accept this award in the spirit of a curator of some precious heirloom which he holds in trust for its true owners -- all those to whom beauty is truth and truth beauty -- and in whose eyes the beauty of genuine brotherhood and peace is more precious than diamonds or silver or gold.

-- Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968), Baptist minister and civil rights activist, Nobel Prize acceptance speech, Oslo, 10 December 1964

Choice

When you have to make a choice and don't make it, that is in itself a choice.

-- William James (1842-1910), American psychologist and philosopher

The Tumult Soon Subsides

Perhaps the sentiments contained in the following pages, are not YET sufficiently fashionable to procure them general favour; a long habit of not thinking a thing WRONG, gives it a superficial appearance of being RIGHT, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom.  But the tumult soon subsides.  Time makes more converts than reason.

-- Thomas Paine (1737-1908), English-American political writer and activist, Common Sense, Introduction (10 January 1776)

Uneasy

I'm kind of glad that nobody got in this year.  I feel honored to be in the Hall of Fame.  And I would've felt a little uneasy sitting up there on the stage, listening to some of these new guys talk about how great they were. ... I don't know how great some of these players up for election would've been without drugs.  But to me, it's cheating.

-- Baseball Hall of Famer Al Kaline (1934-), as for only the second time in 40 years no one was elected on this year's ballot, rejecting first-time nominees Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Sammy Sosa, all accused of steroid use, 9 January 2013

Valuable

The most valuable thing you can make is a mistake - you can't learn anything from being perfect.

-- Adam Osborne (1939-2003), American entrepreneur

Not Every Mistake

Non enim omnis error stultitia est dicenda.
We must not say that every mistake is a foolish one.

-- Marcus Tullius Cicero (3 January 106 BC - 7 December 43 BC), De divinatione ii, 43, as cited in Cicero: a sketch of his life and works, by Hannis Taylor, Mary Lillie Taylor Hunt, second edition (1916), p. 481

Dance Dance

Nemo enim fere saltat sobrius, nisi forte insanit.
[No one dances sober, unless he is insane.]


-- Marcus Tullius Cicero (3 January 106 BC - 7 December 43 BC), also known by the anglicized name Tully, in and after the Middle Ages) orator and statesman of Ancient Rome, Pro Murena Ch. vi, sec.  13

Until I Got Here

I didn't realize how much I didn't want to be here until I got here.

-- Senator Charles E. Schumer (D-NY), on returning to the Capitol, New York Times, 27 December 2012

Palace Intrigue

Americans are tired of the palace intrigue and political partisanship of this congress, which places one upmanship ahead of the lives of the citizens who sent these people to Washington DC in the first place.

-- Governor Chris Christie (R-NJ), on the failure of the House of Representatives to vote on aid for victims of Hurricane Sandy, 2 January 2012

I Am Disappoint

Today is the final day in the 13th Bak'tun, the 144,000-day cycle (~5122 years; this one started 11 August 3114BC) of the ancient Mayan Long Count Calendar -- otherwise known as the Mayan apocalypse.

I am disappoint.

So Late So Soon?

How did it get so late so soon?  It's night before it's afternoon.
December is here before it's June.  My goodness how the time has flewn.
How did it get so late so soon?

-- Theodor Seuss Geisel (1904-1991), aka Dr. Seuss, American writer and cartoonist

RIP Dan Inouye

Democracy is an imperfect concept slowly seeking perfection.

However, I note that we Americans have been quite impatient with people of other lands who have not embraced our democracy.  In some cases, we have officially condemned these nations in very harsh terms, and, in some, we have even used military force.

The question we Americans have debated over the decades is simple but profound: "Should we impose our will upon other lands?  Or should we adopt a more peaceful path in convincing others of the goodness of our system and philosophy?" I suppose this matter will be debated for as long as we exist.

-- Daniel Ken Inouye (7 September 1924-17 December 2012), Hawaii's first Representative and 6-term Senator, in office since statehood, Medal of Honor awardee; Commencement Address, American University, 8 May 2005

missing

I miss the part of me that died when he died.  The innocent...the joyful. The part of me that couldn't wait to take pictures of the kids and hang them on the wall...the part of me that was always hoping someone would ask me how many children I had...the part of me that woke up every morning feeling overwhelmed with blessings.

-- Mark's Mommy, missingmarkallen.blogspot.com, 1 October 2012











[tribute to the victims of the 14 december 2012 shooting at sandy hook school in newtown, ct]

Three Legs Of The Stool

There are three legs of the stool; spending, entitlements and making the tax code fair and equitable.  That's the three legs of the stool.  If we do all of those in a responsible, bipartisan way, I think the American people would all be very, very happy.

-- Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill (24 July 1953-)

We Can't Have Both

We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both.

-- Louis Brandeis (1856-1941), U.S. Supreme Court Justice, quoted by Raymond Lonergan in Mr. Justice Brandeis, Great American (1941), p. 42

RIP Ravi Shankar

I have always encouraged the creativity of an artist. But one has to have solid knowledge and know the rules to break it. Improvisation does not mean tampering with the authenticity of a classical raga. I was probably way beyond my time when I first started to experiment with western instruments and western musicians. Contrary to popular belief, I never performed with the Beatles. George Harrison came to me as he was so taken by our music and became my student. It was not a fad for him, he loved it until the end and became very very dear to me. John Coltrane was so impressed by my music and had a few lessons from me, and again was so moved that he named his son after me.

-- Ravi Shankar (7 April 1920 - 11 December 2012), often referred to by the title Pandit, Indian musician and composer who played the sitar, from a conversation between Raviji and Satish and Shashi Vyas, June 2007

Space-Faring Species

If God wanted man to become a space-faring species, He would have given man a Moon.

-- Krafft A. Ehricke, "Lunar Industrialization and Settlement -- Birth of a Polyglobal Civilization," Lunar Bases and Space Activities of the 21st Century (1985), 827-855

Too Much Energy

The more energy you build up in a system, the more likely it is that that energy will be dumped in an undesirable way.

-- Don Appleman, 16 December 2005

Widely Grokked

It is widely grokked that cats have the hacker nature.

-- Eric S. Raymond (4 December 1957-), American computer programmer and author, The Jargon File

Some Lessons

Some lessons you can't learn from your parents; you have to learn them from your kids.

-- Don Appleman, 8 November 2012

Obvious

[W]e have now sunk to a depth at which the restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men.

-- George Orwell (1902-1950), pen name of British novelist, essayist, and journalist Eric Arthur Blair, review of Power: A New Social Analysis by Bertrand Russell in Adelphi (January 1939)

Shindig

How I spent my weekend: 1,534 miles driving (23:20 on the road, including stops) in a 60-hour weekend, to Arlington, VA to celebrate Big Ed Cohen's 50th birthday with Dan LaBerge and 100 others.  It had a theme; everyone was to wear black, white, or black and white, as part of a costume, or simply as a color scheme.  Quite a shindig.

Non-Member Observer State

The General Assembly, ...

Decides to accord to Palestine non-member observer State status in the United Nations, without prejudice to the acquired rights, privileges and role of the Palestine Liberation Organization in the United Nations as the representative of the Palestinian people, in accordance with the relevant resolutions and practice; ...

-- Excerpt from the one-sentence, four-page UN Resolution granting Palestine non-member observer State status in the United Nations, 29 November 2012

Onion

UPDATE:  For more coverage on The Onion's Sexiest Man Alive 2012, Kim Jong-Un, please visit our friends at the People's Daily in China, a proud Communist subsidiary of The Onion, Inc.  Exemplary reportage, comrades.

-- Update to an article declaring North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un sexiest man alive, after the satirical story was taken seriously and run in the People's Daily, The Onion, 28 November 2012

A Transgression Of The Limit

It is in the nature of every application of violence that it tends toward a transgression of the limit within which it is tolerated and viewed as legitimate.  Even the best discipline cannot always prevent police officers from striking harder than circumstances require, or prison wardens from inflicting brutalities on inmates.

-- Ludwig Heinrich Edler von Mises (1881-1973), Austrian economist, philosopher, author, and classical liberal, Omnipotent Government, p. 156

Captain

God's will and elections made me the captain of this ship.

-- Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, in response to protests over his seizure of unchecked authority, New York Times, 24 November 2012

Still Ticking

Today, my 1999 Saturn SC-2 reached 300,000 miles; and I'm still getting 35+ mpg.

Be Careful

Time is the coin of your life.  It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent.  Be careful lest you let other people spend it for you.

-- Carl Sandburg (1878-1967), American poet, historian, and novelist

Hungry To Smell Them All

In the meantime, I am celebrating, in my way.  I live for now.  I literally stop and smell the flowers.  I don't care what passersby think of the bald man sticking his nose into every flowering tree and shrub he can find. When Jan and I take evening walks, I try to track down the various perfumes that waft our way.  It's been a strange spring, with lots of blooming schedules pushed earlier and on top of each other, but it's been a great spring for a guy with a nose that's hungry to smell them all.

-- Joe Seeley (1960-2012), 3 April 2012

Some Crazy Cliff

I'm standing on the edge of some crazy cliff.  What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff -- I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them.  That's all I'd do all day.  I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all.  I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing I'd really like to be.  I know it's crazy.

-- J. D. Salinger (1919-2010), American author, Holden Caulfield in The Catcher in the Rye (1951), Chapter 22

Idleness

To blame the poor for subsisting on welfare has no justice unless we are also willing to judge every rich member of society by how productive he or she is.  Taken individual by individual, it is likely that there's more idleness and abuse of government favors among the economically privileged than among the ranks of the disadvantaged.

-- Norman Mailer (1923-2007), American author, actor, and political candidate, Esquire, Volume 126, Page 121 (1996)

Bank Accounts

The battle for the airwaves cannot be limited to only those who have the bank accounts to pay for the battle and win it.  Democracy is in danger. Seats in Congress, seats in the state legislature, that big seat in the White House itself, can be purchased by those who have the greatest campaign resources, who have the largest bank accounts or own riches. That, I submit to you, is no democracy.  It is an oligarchy of the already powerful.

-- Walter Leland Cronkite Jr (1916-2009), American broadcast journalist, anchor for The CBS Evening News (1962-1981), Free the Airwaves! (2002)

We The People

... Corporations have no consciences, no beliefs, no feelings, no thoughts, no desires.  Corporations help structure and facilitate the activities of human beings, to be sure, and their "personhood" often serves as a useful legal fiction.  But they are not themselves members of "We the People" by whom and for whom our Constitution was established.

-- Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, in his dissent to the Citizens United decision, 21 January 2010

Are And Forever Will Be

America, I believe we can build on the progress we've made and continue to fight for new jobs and new opportunity and new security for the middle class.  I believe we can keep the promise of our founders, the idea that if you're willing to work hard, it doesn't matter who you are or where you come from or what you look like or where you love.  It doesn't matter whether you're black or white or Hispanic or Asian or Native American or young or old or rich or poor, able, disabled, gay or straight, you can make it here in America if you're willing to try.

I believe we can seize this future together because we are not as divided as our politics suggests.  We're not as cynical as the pundits believe.  We are greater than the sum of our individual ambitions, and we remain more than a collection of red states and blue states.  We are and forever will be the United States of America.

-- Barack Obama, in his re-election victory speech, 7 November 2012

Not Hard-Add Enough

[I]f we lose this election there is only one explanation -- demographics. If I hear anybody say it was because Romney wasn't conservative enough I'm going to go nuts.  We're not losing 95 percent of African-Americans and two-thirds of Hispanics and voters under 30 because we're not being hard-ass enough.

-- South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, in an interview with Jonathan Martin of Politico, 5 November 2012

Cheetos

The voters have spoken and we have to respect their will.  This will be a complicated process, but we intend to follow through.  That said, federal law still says marijuana is an illegal drug so don't break out the Cheetos or gold fish too quickly.

-- Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper, after Colorado voters passed Amendment 64, allowing for the legal, recreational use of marijuana, 7 November 2012

Put The People Before The Poltics

The nation, as you know, is at a critical point.  At a time like this, we can't risk partisan bickering and political posturing.  Our leaders have to reach across the aisle to do the people's work.  And we citizens also have to rise to the occasion.

We look to our teachers and professors, we count on you not just to teach, but to inspire our children with a passion for learning and discovery.  We look to our pastors and priests and rabbis and counselors of all kinds to testify of the enduring principles upon which our society is built: honesty, charity, integrity and family.  We look to our parents, for in the final analysis everything depends on the success of our homes.  We look to job creators of all kinds.  We're counting on you to invest, to hire, to step forward.  And we look to Democrats and Republicans in government at all levels to put the people before the politics.

I believe in America.  I believe in the people of America.  And I ran for office because I'm concerned about America.  This election is over, but our principles endure.  I believe that the principles upon which this nation was founded are the only sure guide to a resurgent economy and to renewed greatness.

-- Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney, concesssion speech, 7 November 2012

Much More Importance

American youth attributes much more importance to arriving at driver's license age than at voting age.

-- Marshall McLuhan (1911-1980), Canadian philosopher of communication theory, Understanding Media (1964)

Discovery

Perhaps the best known, and certainly the most vaunted, "discovery" of modern public opinion research is the indifference and ignorance of a majority of the electorate in western democracies.

-- Sir Moses I. Finley CBE FBA (1912-1986), American and English classical scholar, Democracy Ancient And Modern (1985), Chapter 1, Leaders and Followers, p. 3

Democracy Gap

The "democracy gap" in our politics and elections spells a deep sense of powerlessness by people who drop out, do not vote, or listlessly vote for the "least worst" every four years and then wonder why after every cycle the "least worst" gets worse.

-- Ralph Nader (1934-), American lawyer and Green Party politician, Green Party Presidential Candidacy Speech, 21 February 2001