Quotes of the Week

From the Light:

“Compulsion as a general rule and way of life is something that has to be seen and rejected as unacceptable. When that happens, the revolution will be upon us.”
Michael Rozeff

“Freedom isn't created by consensus. Consensus doesn't produce innovation. And an important minority of the human race -- that troublemaking best-of-the-best -- isn't made for consensus. It's made for moving in directions others haven't yet discovered.”
Claire Wolfe

“Real peace is the absence of aggression, whether on an international scale or localized within a small area. Real peace requires not merely the absence of large-scale military conflicts, but also the absence of aggression in domestic affairs concerning individual citizens.”
Ben O’Neill

“As for 'state,' what is one? Can I touch it, see it, throw a rock at it? In short, it’s nothing but a fictitious concept. An ephemeral nonentity. You might as well be talking about the tooth fairy or the Great Pumpkin.”
Alex R. Knight III

“Never mind whether the drug laws themselves are compatible with a free society; without the enforcement tools of a virtually unlimited police state, they are unenforceable.”
Kevin Carson

“America need not fear the terrorists or even a foreign invasion. The U.S. government is doing a fine job taking down our country all on its own.”
Jacob Hornberger

“We're deep in a debt pit and digging ourselves in ever deeper, soothed by the conceit that America is too big to fail, even though all previous world hegemons have in the end failed. We think of ourselves as an exception to that historical record, but chances are we're not.”

Ron Smith

“Just as liberty has become a low order of priority for concern politically, so has the individual become a low order of priority for concern philosophically. And, of course, it follows. The collectivist view of society, which dominates politics of both parties and most people today, also dominates the view of man himself. In both instances the word of the day is that men must be ruled, that they are unworthy of liberty, and that progress is only possible through the programs of a special elite, the politicians.”
Karl Hess

“The libertarian response to arguments in favor of encroaching government control over our personal choices should be that culture, not law, is the proper vehicle for social change, and that the very notion that debate should be cut short by force of law, especially when it comes to mundane personal choices, ought to be morally repugnant.”
Michael Kleen

“Well, you can lead a statist to information, but you can't make him think.”
Kent MacManigal

“It should not come as a surprise. America is now a one-party state. The one party is the Establishment party, which is also the war party. Unless you are willing to cheer permanent war for permanent peace, you cannot be a member of the Establishment.”
William S. Lind

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From the Darkness:

“The Zen-like chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve might not have topped the list solely for turning his superb academic career into a blueprint for action, for single-handedly reinventing the role of a central bank, or for preventing the collapse of the U.S. economy. But to have done all of these within the span of a few months is certainly one of the greatest intellectual feats of recent years.”
Foreign Affairs magazine, on Ben Bernanke

“I refuse to accept the notion that we cannot summon that unity again. I believe with every fiber of my being that we — as Americans — can still come together behind a common purpose. For our values are not simply words written into parchment — they are a creed that calls us together, and that has carried us through the darkest of storms as one nation, one people.”
B. Oama [Hiel!]

“The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t.”
Kevin Trenberth, one of the leading authors of the IPCC report on climate change

"We support Mr. Obama’s decision, and this national effort, notwithstanding our concerns about the determination of the president and his party to see it through. Now that he’s committed, so is the country, and one of our abiding principles is that nations should never start (much less escalate) wars they don’t intend to win."

The Wall Street Journal [How are 300 million people "committed" to ANYTHING?]

“Within a century, Treasure Island, this place where we are right now, could be totally under water. It is technology in the end that will save us.”
Governor of California Arnold Schwarzenegger, still promoting the debunked predictions of rising sea levels.

“I am of course hopeful that the president’s plan will work. If anyone can make it work, it is our wonderful military with its tens of thousands of dedicated patriots and citizens serving voluntarily to defend their country in difficult and dangerous places. I would encourage all Americans to pray for our commander in chief and for all of those who serve in our nation’s armed forces as they seek to defend our freedom in a dangerous and difficult world. We should also remember to pray for the families they leave behind and the significant sacrifices they make for our nation’s freedom as well.”
Richard “Kill for Jeezus” Land, president of the Southern Baptist’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission