Edmund Burke -

Hypocrisy can afford to be magnificent in its promises; for never intending to go beyond promises, it costs nothing

H.L. Mencken -

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.

Donald Sensing -

At bottom, modern environmentalism has discarded scientific rigor to embrace something not much different than Leninism, the desire to control the major components of the way individuals live. From there it is a short step for environmentalism to Leninism's successor: Stalinism, the desire to control every aspect of the way we live. That's our future, minus the gulags. We hope.

Guy Herbert -

...The security theatre in fact heightens the perception of threat - and the politicians, being for the most part innumerate, unscientific, weathervanes of public emotion, are the most susceptible to it. They don't invent the threat to justify totalitarianism, but will embrace totalitarianism joyfully as a concomitant of their own inability to judge the magnitude, and their unwillingness to take responsibility for the consequences of taking any position at all. What we have is a malign feedback caused by political desire to be seen doing something pumping up the media. That's why every fantasist is presented as a real danger, every near-random act of successful violence be a civilization-threatening strategic blow. Which only encourages would-be terrorists in their sense of their own importance. It is a folie á deaux between two groups of showoffs.

John Adams -

The precept of the Koran is, perpetual war against all who deny, that Mahomet is the prophet of God. The vanquished may purchase their lives, by the payment of tribute; the victorious may be appeased by a false and delusive promise of peace; and the faithful follower of the prophet, may submit to the imperious necessities of defeat: but the command to propagate the Moslem creed by the sword is always obligatory, when it can be made effective. The commands of the prophet may be performed alike, by fraud, or by force.

Samuel Adams -

If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen

Roger de Hauteville -

Capitalism isn't a system. Got that? Capitalism is the lack of a system. Why can't you fools understand this? Capitalism is freedom. All "systems" are the enemies of freedom, because they rely on the opinions of a few-- usually very cranky-- people, instead of on the collective wisdom of everyone acting in their own self interest, tempered by their innate generosity. Capitalism is the unfettered desire and ability of humans to barter with one another and accumulate knowledge and things. That's it. In capitalism, certain institutions arise because the market signals they are necessary in the first place, and supports them after they are established. In general, when people who do not understand this desire of humans to barter and accumulate things attack these useful institutions, they destroy wealth and impoverish people. That confab in Davos is the poster child for that sort of meddling. Repeat after me: Hong Kong-good. North Korea-bad.

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks -

A tolerant society is one that ignores differences and a multi-cultural one is one that highlights them.

Winston Churchill -

Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.

Alexis de Tocqueville -

[Democratic despotism] seeks only to keep them fixed irrevocably in childhood; it likes citizens to enjoy themselves provided that they think only of enjoying themselves… . It willingly works for their happiness; but it wants to be the unique agent and sole arbiter of that; it provides for their security, foresees and secures their needs, facilitates their pleasures, conducts their principal affairs, directs their industry, regulates their estates, divides their inheritances; can it not take away from them entirely the trouble of thinking and the pain of living? … [This power] extends its arms over society as a whole; it covers its surface with a network of small, complicated, painstaking, uniform rules through which the most original minds and the most vigorous souls cannot clear a way to surpass the crowd; … it does not tyrannize, it hinders, compromises, enervates, extinguishes, dazes, and finally reduces each nation to being nothing more than a herd of timid and industrious animals of which the government is the shepherd.

Evan Coyne Maloney -

The dogma of multiculturalism holds that all cultures are equal, except Western culture, which (unlike every other society on the planet) has a history of oppression and war is therefore worse. All religions are equal, except Christianity, which informed the beliefs of the capitalist bloodsuckers who founded America and is therefore worse. All races are equal, except Caucasians, who long ago went into business with black slave traders in Africa, and therefore they are worse. The genders, too, are equal, except for those paternalistic males, who with their testosterone and aggression have made this planet a polluted living hell, and therefore they are worse. Once you understand this, the Multicultural Pyramid of Oppression, you can begin to understand how to turn to your advantage certain circumstances that are beyond your control: such as where you were born, the type of genitalia you were born with, into what race you were born, and the religion of your parents. You see, the fewer things you have in common with The Oppressors, the more you can cast yourself as The Victim. And as The Victim, you are virtuous, so there are certain things you can get away with that others can’t: like actually oppressing people.

Doris Lessing -

WHILE we have seen the apparent death of Communism, ways of thinking that were either born under Communism or strengthened by Communism still govern our lives. Not all of them are as immediately evident as a legacy of Communism as political correctness...

Wilfrid Laurier -

What is hateful is not rebellion but the despotism which induces that rebellion; what is hateful are not rebels but the men who, having the enjoyment of power, do not discharge the duties of power; they are the men who, having the power to redress wrongs, refuse to listen to the petitions that are sent to them; they are the men who, when they are asked for a loaf, give a stone.

Benito Mussolini -

The corporate State considers that private enterprise in the sphere of production is the most effective and useful instrument in the interest of the nation. In view of the fact that private organization of production is a function of national concern, the organizer of the enterprise is responsible to the State for the direction given to production. State intervention in economic production arises only when private initiative is lacking or insufficient, or when the political interests of the State are involved. This intervention may take the form of control, assistance or direct management.

John Brignell -

The global warmers like to use the name of science, but they do not like its methods. They promote slogans such as “The science is settled” when real scientists know that science is never settled... The world might (or might not) have warmed by a fraction of a degree. This might (or might not) be all (or in part) due to the activities of mankind. It all depends on the quality of observations and the validity of various hypotheses. Science is at ease with this situation. It accepts various theories, such as gravitation or evolution, as the least bad available and of the most practical use, but it does not believe. Religion is different.

Thomas Sowell -

There is really nothing very mysterious about why our public schools are failures. When you select the poorest quality college students to be public school teachers, give them iron-clad tenure, a captive audience, and pay them according to seniority rather than performance, why should the results be surprising?

Ours may become the first civilization destroyed, not by the power of our enemies, but by the ignorance of our teachers and the dangerous nonsense they are teaching our children. In an age of artificial intelligence, they are creating artificial stupidity.

Fjordman, again -

The Multiculturalist uncreated mankind in his own image: Confused, self-loathing individuals with no concept of right or wrong. And he didn’t create them male of female. He said that they were identical, and that claiming otherwise was sexist. And the Multiculturalist cursed them and said, “Be barren and decrease in numbers, vanish from the face of the earth, let Mother Nature rule and the fish of the sea and the birds of the air reclaim the world.” The Multiculturalist then said, “Let here be darkness,” and there was darkness. The Multiculturalist saw that the darkness was good, and he unseparated the darkness from the light. The Multiculturalist called the light “discrimination and bigotry,” and the darkness he called “tolerance.” On the seventh day, the Multiculturalist rested, and he saw that it was good. He had unmade reason, he had unmade logic, he had unmade truth, he had unmade the very reason and desire to exist. And there was evening on the seventh day, but there was no new morning.

Fjordman -

There is probably a new Great Idea for every generation. It changes just enough for people to be duped again, but it always entails some form of large-scale change for millions of people. The less it corresponds to reality, the better. The point is to outbid others in Utopian ideas. What is behind it? Well, the joy of destroying the Established Order to bring purpose into otherwise purposeless lives and the desire to immerse oneself into grandiose ideas. The desire for personal power and the joy of being able to harass opponents shouldn’t be underestimated, either. If you claim that your Utopian ideas are about justice and equality, you can also claim that those who disagree with you are proponents of injustice and inequality, in other words evil, and outside the boundaries of civilized debate. One should always be mindful of people who profess an ideology that entails sweeping changes to society, claim that this represents the unstoppable tide of history, and yet for some reason need to shut down critics through intimidation. If their ideology is so great, how come they are so reluctant to accept criticism? Good ideas can be rationally defended. If people resist critical scrutiny of their ideas, this is usually a powerful indication of the fact that these ideas are neither truthful nor desirable.

Galileo -

I believe that good philosophers fly alone, like eagles and not in flocks like starlings. It is true that because eagles are rare birds they are little seen and less heard, while birds that fly like starlings fill the sky with shrieks and cries, and wherever they settle befoul the earth beneath them.

John Galsworthy -

Idealism increases in direct proportion to one’s distance from the problem.