Thread: Quotes for our time.

I thought it would be good to have a thread where folks might post quotes they like or know of that are applicable to our current times. People who frequent this forum are a diverse swath of American life, so to me at least, it would be interesting to see the different quotes people find applicable or representative.


I would start with this one:

A portion of mankind take pride in their vices and pursue their purpose; many more waver between doing what is right and complying with what is wrong.
Horace

Pale Death with impartial tread beats at the poor man's cottage door and at the palaces of kings.
Horace

The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men. Plato

Wheeee!!! I collect quotes like some ladies try to collect jewelry (prized little things that are kept safe not only to share but to pass down to the next generation )

The radical invents the views.
When he has worn them out the conservative adopts them.

It could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress.

Never let formal education get in the way of your learning.

"Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself."

"There are lies, damned lies, and statistics."

"There are times when one would like to hang the whole human race, and finish the farce."

"To my mind Judas Iscariot was nothing but a low, mean, premature Congressman."

We have the best government that money can buy.

^-^-^-^-^-^Mark Twain^-^-^-^-^-^



It is the absolute right of the state to supervise the formation of public opinion.
--------Joseph Goebbels

The education of all children, from the moment they can get along without their mother's care, shall be in state institutions at state expense.
--------Karl Marx, in "The Communist Manifesto"

You can't rule the innocent. So it behooves government to make sure that everyone is guilty of something.
--------Mark Twain (I THINK)

Life, liberty and the pursuit of
happiness is a hard nut to crack.
--------Lincoln

Schools have not necessarily much to do with education... they are mainly institutions of control, where basic habits must be inculcated in the young. Education is quite different and has little place in school.
–------ Winston Churchill

The millions of dollars which we devote every year to high-school education are, for the most part, money spent for the retarding of intelligence, the discouragement of efficiency, the stunting of character.
– Bernard Iddings Bell (1949)

(yes, I have some issues with education in modern America *shrug*)


A personal favorite of mine:

"Political Correctness is a doctrine fostered by a delusional, illogical liberal minority, and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end." - unknown


And in closing:

I hate quotations.
--------Ralph Waldo Emmerson

Originally Posted by working4change

The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men. Plato

How true!

Welcome orchid_noir

I have always like this one. I even preached it to my kids. I still do.


"A person who never makes mistakes must get tired of doing nothing"

Will Rogers (if I remember correctly)

The government is like a baby's alimentary canal, with a happy appetite at one end and no responsibility at the other......Ronald Reagan

The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of the blessings. The inherent blessing of socialism is the equal sharing of misery.......Winston Churchill

A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything away....Thomas Jefferson

Supose you were and idiot. And suppose you were a member of congress....but then I repeat myself.......Mark Twain

I contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into properity Is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle....
Winston Churchill

A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul......George Bernard Shaw

OK one more

Foreign Aid might be defined as a transfer of money from poor people to rich countries to rich people in poor countries....Douglas Casey, (Classmate of Bill Clinton at Georgetown University.)

All good ones SOSAD. I especially like this one:

Quote:

A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything away....Thomas Jefferson

Isn't that Hillary's position. "I will take the profits of the oil companies.. . ."

Originally Posted by Gogo

All good ones SOSAD. I especially like this one:

Quote:

A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything away....Thomas Jefferson

Isn't that Hillary's position. "I will take the profits of the oil companies.. . ."

Yes, I think you are right Gogo

The United States is a nation of laws: badly written and randomly enforced.
Frank Zappa (1940 - 1993)

I just want to say this. I want to say it gently but I want to say it firmly: There is a tendency for the world to say to America, "the big problems of the world are yours, you go and sort them out," and then to worry when America wants to sort them out.
Tony Blair (1953 - )

We are all atheists about most of the gods that societies have ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further.
Richard Dawkins (1941 - ), "The Root of All Evil", UK Channel 4, 2006

"The twentieth century has been characterized by three developments of great political importance: the growth of democracy, the growth of corporate power, and the growth of corporate propaganda as a means of protecting corporate power against democracy."

-- Alex Carey