A-F
Quote Archives
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A-F
Ziad K. Abdelnour
It has an often repeated axiom that a person can learn a whole lot about a society by how it treats its poor. But just as much can be learned by looking at how that society treats its rich. Indeed, the economic future of the poor – and our nation – will be determined in the coming decades by how we treat the people in this country who create great wealth. It will be determined by our understanding of the so-called rich. And our ability to protect this minority…. If the majority of Americans smear, harass, overtax, and over regulate this minority of wealth creators, our politicians will be shocked and horrified to discover how swiftly the physical tokens of the means of production collapse into so much corroded wire, eroding concrete, and scrap metal. They will be amazed at how quickly the wealth of America is either destroyed, or flees to other countries.
A great number of the richest among us never finished high school, and many who went to college never managed to graduate. That’s because the rich in this country are chosen not by blood, credentials, education, or services to the establishment. The rich are chosen for performance, and for their relentless desire to serve consumers…. In short, our rich – America’s best entrepreneurs – perform work that most others spurn…. the richest among us usually begin as rebels and outsiders…. Under capitalism, wealth is less a stock of goods than a flow of ideas… The wealth of America isn’t an inventory of goods; it’s an organic, living entity, a fragile, pulsing fabric of ideas, expectations, loyalties, moral commitments, visions, and people. To vivisect it for redistribution would eventually kill it.
John Adams
“The only foundation of a free Constitution, is pure virtue, and if this cannot be inspired into our people, in a greater measure than they have it now, they may change their rulers, and the forms of government, but they will not obtain a lasting liberty.” –John Adams, letter to Zabdiel Adams, 1776
“The moment that idea is admitted into society that property is not as
sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and
public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. Property
must be sacred or liberty cannot exist.” John Adams
~~“The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred
as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public
justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If ‘Thou shalt not
covet’ and ‘Thou shalt not steal’ were not commandments of Heaven, they
must be made inviolable precepts in every society before it can be
civilized or made free.” — John Adams
Samuel Adams
“If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude
greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home and leave us in
peace. We seek not your council, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the
hand that feeds you; and may posterity forget that ye were our country
men.”
“Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: first, a right to life;
second, to liberty; third, to property; together with the right to
support and defend them in the best manner they can. These are evident
branches of … the duty of self-preservation, commonly called the first
law of nature. All men have a right to remain in a state of nature as
long as they please; and in case of intolerable oppression, civil or
religious, to leave the society they belong to, and enter into
another…. Now what liberty can there be where property is taken away
without consent?” (Nov 20, 1772)
Isaiah Amberay
An enemy of liberty is no friend of mine. I do not owe respect to
anyone who would enslave me by government force, nor is it wise for such
a person to expect it. ”
Anonymous
“Gore Headquarters is now known as The Home Of The Whopper.”
“The person who says it cannot be done should not interrupt the person doing it.” –Chinese Proverb
“If you must burn our flag, wrap yourself in it first.”
“If guns cause crime, then pencils cause misspelled words.”
“Blessed are they who can laugh at themselves, for they shall never cease to be amused.”
“When they took the fourth amendment, I was quiet because I didn’t deal drugs.
When they took the sixth amendment, I was quiet because I was innocent. When
they took the second amendment, I was quiet because I didn’t own a gun. Now
they’ve taken the first amendment, and I can say nothing about it.”
“No, the two kinds of people on earth I mean,
Are the people who lift,
And the people who lean.
Wherever you go you’ll find the world’s masses
Are always divided into just these two classes.
And oddly enough, you’ll find too, I ween,
There’s only one lifter,
To twenty who lean.”
W. James Antle III
“Just as conservatives must remember the limits of government, libertarians must
understand the importance of virtue. A free society rests in part on shared
values, including a common understanding of the intrinsic value of each
individual and the obligation to respect others’ rights.”
Thomas Aquinas
“If the highest aim of a captain were to preserve his ship, he would keep it in port forever.”
Aristotle
… Money is your means of survival. The verdict you pronounce upon the source of
your livelihood is the verdict you pronounce upon your life. If the
source is corrupt, you have damned your own existence.
Doug Bandow
Property rights are a basic human right, the best defense for those with the
least political influence. -Doug Bandow
Dave Barry
“To you taxpayers out there, let me say this: Make
sure you file your tax return on time! And remember that, even though
income taxes can be a ‘pain in the neck,’ the folks at the
IRS are regular people just like you, except that they can
destroy your life.”
Frederic Bastiat
“Now since man is naturally inclined to avoid pain – and since labor is pain
itself – it follows that men will resort to plunder whenever plunder is
easier than work. History shows this quite clearly. And under these
conditions, neither religion nor morality can stop it.
“When, then, does plunder stop? It stops when it becomes more painful and more
dangerous than labor.
It is evident, then, that the proper purpose of the law is to use the power of
its collective force to stop this fatal tendency to plunder instead of
to work. All the measures of the law should protect property and punish
plunder.” ……
Since the law organizes justice, the socialists ask why the law should not also
organize labor, education, and religion.
Why should not law be used for these purposes?
Because it could not organize labor, education, and religion
without destroying justice. We must remember that law is force, and that, consequently, the proper
functions of the law cannot lawfully extend beyond the proper functions
of force.
People are beginning to realize that the apparatus of government is
costly. But what they do not know is that the burden falls inevitably on
them. — Frederic Bastiat
Max Victor Belz
“I don’t want my children fed or clothed by the State, but I would
prefer that to their being educated by the State.”
– Max Victor Belz, Iowa grain dealer
William Blake
“He who would do good to another must do it in Minute Particulars. General Good
is the plea of the scoundrel, hypocrite, and flatterer.”
Reverend William J. H. Boetcke
· You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift
· You cannot help small men by tearing down big men.
· You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
· You cannot lift the wage-earner by pulling down the wage-payer.
· You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
· You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than your income.
· You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
· You cannot establish security on borrowed money.
· You cannot build character and courage by taking away men’s initiative and
independence.
· You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should
do for themselves.
Neil Boortz
“I absolutely believe that the biggest crisis facing this country today is
government education. American parents have surrendered their
responsibility for the education of their children to government — and
increasingly to the Imperial Federal Government. The results aren’t
good.”
- Radio talk-show host Neil Boortz
“The single most prevalent form of child abuse in this country
is the act of sending a child to a government school. We worry
incessantly about the separation of church and state. We would
do well to devote half as much attention to the separation of
government and education.” –Neal Boortz
James Bovard
Coercion is the essence of government in the same way that profit is the essence of private businesses….Every increase in the size of government means an increase in coercion. –
Peter Brimelow
“The modern definition of ‘racist’ is someone who is winning an argument
with a liberal.”
– Peter Brimelow
Arthur Brooks
Money does not equal happiness, Brooks said, citing research on lottery winners and welfare programs. “If you don’t earn it, it won’t bring you happiness. True happiness comes from earned success,” he said. The flip side to earned success is learned helplessness, which leads to unhappiness, he said. “We need a free enterprise system that recognizes this. A belief in free enterprise means we also help others find opportunities. When we take the risk out of life, we take the life out of life,” Brooks concluded. “Free enterprise is a noble system, built not on envy but aspiration.” Debate between Jim Wallis and Arthur Brooks
Matthew Brouillette
“While it is true that there are myriad factors contributing to a
child’s success or failure in school, study after study makes clear that
more dollars will not produce more scholars in a monopoly system. Yet
that is precisely what those who benefit from the multi-billion dollar
system demand–more money; and that is exactly what the school boards
and General Assembly provide year after year. “
Harry Browne
“The free market punishes irresponsibility. Government rewards it.”
- Harry Browne
Pat Buchanan:
Equality, egalite, was what the French Revolution, the Bolshevik Revolution, Maos Revolution of 1949, Castro’s Revolution of 1959 and Pol Pot’s revolution of 1975 claimed to be about. This was the Big Lie, for all those revolutions that triumphed in the name of equality were marked by mass murders of the old ruling class, the rise of a new ruling class more brutal and tyrannical, and the immiseration of the people in whose name the revolution was supposedly fought….behind the latest crusade against inequality lie motives other than any love of the poor. They are resentment, envy and greed for what the wealthy have, and an insatiable lust for power. – Pat Buchanan
Edmund Burke
All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.
“Men are qualified for liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites.”
“Nobody makes a greater mistake than he who does nothing because he could only do a little.”
George Burns
“Neither Gracie nor I were interested in politics….In those days
show-business people concentrated on show business, while politicians
concentrated on giving people the business. Performers never ran for
office, although some of the people who ran for office turned out to be
performers.”
George Burns on Gracie Allen’s spoof run for the presidency in 1940
George W. Bush quotes:
~~”I know how hard it is for you to put food on your family.”
—Greater Nashua, N.H., Chamber of Commerce, Jan. 27, 2000
~~”I understand small business growth. I was one.”
—New York Daily News, Feb. 19, 2000
~~”When I was coming up, it was a dangerous world, and you knew exactly who they
were. It was us vs. them, and it was clear who them was. Today, we are
not so sure who the they are, but we know they’re there.”
—Iowa Western Community College, Jan 21, 2000
~~Milton Friedman has shown us that when government attempts to substitute its
own judgments for the judgments of free people, the results are usually
disastrous. In contrast to the free market’s invisible hand, which
improves the lives of people, the government’s invisible foot tramples
on people’s hopes and destroys their dreams.
–President George W. Bush in tribute to Milton Friedman
William H. Chamberlin
“One of the most insidious consequences of the present burden of
the personal income tax is that it strips many middle class families of
financial reserves and seems to lend support to campaigns for socialized
medicine, socialized housing, socialized food, socialized everything.
The personal income tax has made the individual vastly more dependent on
the State and more avid for State handouts. It has shifted the balance
in America from an individual-centered to a State-centered economic and
social system.” – Historian William H. Chamberlin ["The Power
to Destroy" in Essays on Liberty, vol.4, 1958]
“A very good case can be made, on moral as well as economic grounds, for a system in which
the individual is required to stand on his own feet, not to
lean on the state for handouts. Character, resourcefulness, capacity are
formed and developed in struggle with obstacles, not in waiting
passively for benefits from outside.” — William Henry Chamberlin
Linda Chavez
“If we’re willing to deny diplomas to seniors who can’t demonstrate they’ve
earned them, maybe we ought to deny paychecks to school administrators and
teachers who aren’t doing their jobs.”
- Columnist Linda Chavez on new requirements that students must pass
standardized test before they can graduate
Winston Churchill
“If you have 10,000 regulations, you destroy all
respect for the law.” ~~Winston Churchill
“We contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is
like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the
handle.” —Winston Churchill
Cicero (106 BC – 43 BC), 55 BC
The national budget must be balanced. The public debt must be reduced; the arrogance of the authorities must be moderated and controlled. Payments to foreign governments must be reduced, if the nation doesn’t want to go bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance.
Carl Von Clausewitz
The fact that slaughter [battle] is a horrifying spectacle must make us
take
war more seriously, but [it does] not provide an excuse for gradually
blunting our swords in the name of humanity. Sooner or later someone
will
come along with a sharp sword and hack off our arms.
– Carl von Clausewitz
Michael Cloud
“Government central planning devastated the Soviet economy. Government
central planning all but destroyed Soviet industry and agriculture.
Government central planning is decimating education in Massachusetts.”
Calvin Coolidge
Perhaps one of the most important accomplishments of my administration has been
minding my own business.
-Calvin Coolidge
Civilization and profits go hand in hand.
– Calvin Coolidge
“There is no dignity quite so impressive, and no independence quite so
important, as living within your means.” –Calvin Coolidge
“I want the people of America to be able to work less for the Government
and more for themselves. I want them to have the rewards of their own
industry. This is the chief meaning of freedom.” – Calvin Coolidge
(Address accepting the presidential nomination, Aug. 14, 1924)
James Fenimore Cooper
“It is a governing principle of nature, that the agency which can
produce most good, when perverted from its proper aim, is most
productive of evil. It behooves the well-intentioned, therefore,
vigorously to watch the tendency of even their most highly prized
institutions, since that which was established in the interests of the
right, may so easily become the agent of the wrong.”– James Fenimore
Cooper
Ann Coulter
“It’s well past time for [Leftism] to be declared a religion and banned
from public schools. Allowing Christians to be one of many after-school
groups induces hysteria not just because liberals hate religion. It’s
because the public school is their temple. Children must be taught to
love Big Brother, welcoming him to take over our schools, our bank
accounts, our property, even our toilet bowls.” –Ann Coulter
Davy Crockett
“We have the right, as individuals, to give away as much of our own
money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no
right so to appropriate a dollar of the public money.” –Davy Crockett
Charles De Gaulle
In order to become the master, the politician poses as the servant.
–Charles de Gaulle
Tom DeWeese
“The only way to make sure that government doesn’t abuse its power is to
not grant it in the first place.” –Tom DeWeese
Frederick Douglass
To make a contented slave, it is necessary to make a thoughtless one (and) to annihilate the power of reason. He must be able to detect no inconsistencies in slavery, he must be made to feel that slavery is right.
Governor Pete Du Pont
“Steel prices have risen by 30 percent to 50 percent since President Bush
announced the imposition of special tariffs on steel imports in March. .
. . (W)e can hope other countries will learn an unintended lesson from
the steel tariff debacle: that protectionism is the economic equivalent
of shooting yourself in the foot.”
- Columnist and former Delaware Gov. Pete du Pont (from GOP News and
Views)
Albert Einstein
“Being a lover of freedom, when the (Nazi) revolution came, I looked to
the universities to defend it, knowing that they had always boasted of
their devotion to the cause of truth; but no, the universities were
immediately silenced. Then I looked to the great editors of the
newspapers, whose flaming editorials
in days gone by had proclaimed their love of freedom; but they, like the
universities, were silenced in a few short weeks…Only
the Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler’s campaign for
suppressing truth. I never had any special interest in the Church before,
but now I feel a great affection and admiration for it
because the Church alone has had the courage and persistence to
stand for intellectual and moral freedom. I am forced to confess that what
I once despised I now praise unreservedly.” –Albert Einstein from Kampi
und Zeugnis der bekennenden Kirche
Don Feder
Advocates of the omni-state detest capitalism for its impartiality. In place of a system which rewards hard work, ingenuity and risk-taking, it wants rewards based on political power, payoffs and favoritism.
Rep Tom Feeney
“The difference between Congress and drunken sailors is that
drunken sailors are spending their own money.” –Florida Republican
Rep. Tom Feeney
Mallard Fillmore
Separate but Equal:
“Al Gore opposes vouchers and tax credits that would let poor and
middle-class kids go to the same schools as Al Gore’s kids! Maybe he’d
change his mind if they’d make it so the voucher kids had separate
drinking fountains.”
- “Mallard Fillmore” by Bruce Tinsley, 10/5/00
“New studies show that, contrary to popular mythology, the average
home-schooled child has no problem “socializing” with other children… as
long as he remembers to use smaller words and shorter sentences.”
-Mallard Fillmore comic strip
Henry Ford
“Time and money spent in helping men do more for themselves is far better than mere giving.” –Henry Ford
Benjamin Franklin
“They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a
little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” -Benjamin
Franklin
Milton Friedman
“One of the great mistakes is to judge policies and programs by their intentions rather than their results.”
“Government spends what government receives plus as much as it can get away with.”
–Milton Friedman
“If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in five
years there’d be a shortage of sand.”
The strongest argument for free enterprise is that it prevents anybody from having too much power. Whether that person is a government official, a trade union official, or a business executive. It forces them to put up or shut up. They either have to deliver the goods, produce something that people are willing to pay for, are willing to buy, or else they have to go into a different business.
