Quotes

“Our country … may she always be right, but right or wrong, our country!”

– Commodore Stephen Decatur

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“A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within.

An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself.

For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men.

He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murder is less to fear.”

– Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 B.C.) Roman Statesman, philosopher, and Orator

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“Ideology functions as a machine to destroy information, even at the price of making assertions in clear contradiction of the evidence.”

-Jean-Francois Revel

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When we get piled upon one another in large cities, as in Europe, we shall become as corrupt as Europe.

Thomas Jefferson

The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.

Thomas Jefferson

It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes. A principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world.

Thomas Jefferson

I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.

Thomas Jefferson

My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government.

Thomas Jefferson

No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms.

Thomas Jefferson

The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.

Thomas Jefferson

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.

Thomas Jefferson

To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

Thomas Jefferson

Very Interesting Quote

In light of the present financial crisis, it’s  interesting to read what Thomas Jefferson said in 1802:

‘I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.

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“On account of being a democracy and run by the people, we are the only nation in the world that has to keep a government four years, no matter what it does.”

– Will Rogers

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It had become usual to give Napolean the credit for every succesful achievement and every stroke of good fortune. You would often hear one hen remark to another, “Under the guidance of our Leader, Comrade Napolean, I have laid five eggs in six days”; or two cows, enjoying a drink at the pool, would exclaim, “Thanks to the leadership of Comrade Napolean, how excellent this water tastes!”

– Animal Farm, George Orwell

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“If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable – what then?”

– George Orwell, 1984

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