Quotes of the Week

Enlightened insights taken from the past week’s reading:

"We’ve tried too long to force the incompatible beliefs of the left and the right to coexist under the same roof. The failure of this experiment is laid bare with every building set afire, with each store looted, and with every execution of an innocent. We need to cut loose this madness by leaving the U.S.A. The time has come for Texas to blaze a trail of its own, to create a place that respects Liberty and truly fetters government and government actors from mischief; a place where the enemies of Life, Liberty, and Property are swiftly dealt-with without destroying our laws; a place where men of all races are bound together as fellow countrymen with the values of hard work, goodwill, respect, and freedom. The time has come to leave the chaos of the United States and become solely Texans once again. For when we consider the violent alternative, is there really another choice?"
Ryan Thorson

"On television, hour by hour, we watch these people, criminal mobs destroy what the rest of us have built. They have no right to do that. They don't contribute to the common good, they never have. Yet suddenly they seem to have all the power."
Tucker Carlson

"Some libertarians tell me: there's no such thing as left and right; this is a made-up distinction meant to divide us.
Not so, and I can prove it.
I can tell the difference with one question.
'Are rioting and looting wrong?'
One side will say yes. The other will give you a speech. Works every time.
Remember how we were supposed to be terrified of three dozen right-wing extremists with no funding and no foothold in media, entertainment, or academia? And the left were just 'anti-fascist' activists innocently pursuing justice?
Seems pretty dumb today, doesn't it?
(It seemed pretty dumb then, too.)
The left -- and plenty of libertarians, to their profound shame -- can't seem to decide between two ways they want to spin what is currently happening:
(1) Riots are the language of the unheard, and we should try to understand people participating in them even if we (rather tepidly) disapprove.
(2) It's outside agitators spurring the riots, so we shouldn't blame the peaceful protestors.
But if riots are basically understandable, why this rush to assure me that they're being instigated by outsiders? Didn't you just tell me this is an understandable if unfortunate display by the unheard? Pick one!
I am hearing plenty of this: look, sure, it's bad that some people are destroying businesses and stealing what other people worked for, but they're really angry. On some level you have to sympathize with them.
Nope. I don't.
'I have suffered; therefore, other innocents should suffer' -- which of the saints lived by such a monstrous code?
If your child is mistreated and takes his frustration out on my child by randomly beating the hell out of him, I will not gaslight my child by explaining that what happened is sort of understandable on some level.
Screw that.
Somehow we've come to live in a world in which obvious moral truths are now expressions of right-wing extremism."
Tom Woods

"People have an absolute right to assemble, to speak freely, and to petition their government to correct these grievances. Those who are outraged by Mr. Floyd’s death are perfectly within their rights to gather, march, demand transparency and justice, and to protest for those reforms.
However, no one has the right to steal and destroy the property of their fellow Texans. No one has the right to initiate force against innocent members of their community. No one has the right to target and deface our sacred memorials and monuments like the Alamo.
Those who are abusing this tragedy to sow the seeds of discord and pit Texan against Texan have been indiscriminate in their attacks meaning that any person or business could potentially be victimized. It is important that those who would seek to hijack the death of George Floyd to deprive innocent Texans of their rights remember that all Texans have an absolute right to bear and use arms in the protection of themselves, their families, their communities, and their property.
No Texan wants to have to use deadly force to protect themselves, their family, or their community, but they will. Ask Santa Anna."
Daniel Miller

"In many places in America you still can’t get a haircut, but you can go out and riot. In California, thanks to a Supreme Court ruling, you can’t go to church, but you can riot with impunity and burn down lifelong dreams of business owners without facing jail time."
Daniel Horowitz

"What we have been seeing played out on the streets of America, particularly in large Blue State metropolitan areas and dense urban cities is classic planned chaos and the 'Strategy of Tension.' Unable to dislodge Donald Trump by the Russiagate hoax or the malicious soft coup impeachment process, his sworn enemies, using COVID-19 as their pretext, have turned to the destruction of the economy by repressive lockdowns, creating mass unemployment and annihilation of small businesses, thus fracturing civil society. This week the Democrats, the deep state, and their complacent, compliant regime media pawns, have turned to an age-old psy/war strategy to be wielded as an ax against the president, insidiously using the weaponized corpse of the tragically slain George Floyd as the new rationale for these riots and insurrections."
Charles Burris

"'Serving and Protecting State Power, First and Foremost.' That’s really what should be on the side of every cop car.  Anyone who has paid attention to the news over the past week is well aware of how the cops in dozens of American cities just stood there and did next to nothing while the communist ideologues who control Antifa and Black Lives Matter orchestrated mass looting and burning of private property, government buildings, cars, and entire sections of large cities (with the help of thousands of inner-city welfare parasites who they employ as their dupes)." 
Tom DiLorenzo

"When whites die because of police misconduct, we don’t see violent protests that spread across the country that destroy lives and property. Here is one example: In Dallas in 2016, video showing a white man who died after being pinned down by police. A report last year from the Dallas Morning News highlighted how Tony Timpa screamed and begged for help more than 30 times as Dallas law enforcement 'pinned his shoulders, knees and neck to the ground.' Timpa bellowed, 'You’re gonna kill me! You’re gonna kill me! You’re gonna kill me!'After Timpa lost consciousness, the officers who handcuffed him thought he was asleep and didn’t bother to find out if he was breathing or had a pulse. The News added, 'The officers pinned his handcuffed arms behind his back for nearly 14 minutes and zip-tied his legs together. By the time he was loaded onto a gurney and put into an ambulance, the 32-year-old was dead.' No nationwide riots followed this sad event. 
Why are blacks different? In part, the answer is that terrorist groups like Antifa and Black Lives Matter, aided and abetted by their allies in the leftwing media, civil rights organizations, and radical politicians, incite violence."
Lew Rockwell

"Our system is based on the assumption of human agency, free will, and choice. Even if humans could live longest and most happily in the pods of the 'matrix' with every need and sense optimally gratified, we would spurn this utilitarian nirvana. We would seek freedom. We would assert common sense.
Common sense says that if a disease poses the threat of killing millions of elderly people already afflicted by medical conditions, those people should be sequestered and protected. But the rest of us should proceed with our work, taking prudent precautions, even if, amazingly, some of us will die anyway.
Adults in free nations should respect the facts of life and the hierarchies of the universe."
George Gilder

"Thank you Antifa, Black Lives Matter, and Your Fellow Marxist Revolutionaries for proving that the lockdowns were 100% B.S., a political scheme to destroy the economy to hurt Trump politically.  Proof of this is that the entire Leftist political establishment, especially the 'media,' is now encouraging more riots and more mob violence.  If they really thought that such violations of antisocial distancing was so harmful to you, their compatriots and constituents (along with all the welfare parasites and social justice cupcakes participating in the rioting and looting), they would certainly not be encouraging you to risk your lives out there.
Senile old Joe Biden wouldn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell with a good economy; therefore, the economy had to be destroyed.  It was the only moral thing to do."
Tom DiLorenzo

"The riots have been co-opted. Where whites and blacks, conservatives and liberals alike were mostly in agreement, now there are attempts at division. Why is the death of Floyd being presented as a race issue in the first place? Why is it not being presented as a psychopath issue?
There are psychopaths in every race in equal numbers, and this should be people's focus. In other words, psychopaths must be removed from society, whether they be police, politicians, business leaders or even 'caretakers'."
Bob Livingston

"'Systemic racism' is a racist notion.
And those who promulgate it are therefore, by definition, racists and should be treated as such.
A racist is someone who judges people negatively based on the color of their skin and not the content of their character, to rephrase Martin Luther King, Jr.’s famous dictum.  The notion of 'systemic racism,' an invention of the cultural Marxists who now control the academic world, means that all white people are naturally racists.  Doing a quick internet survey of the concept I discovered a writer who actually said that a white man who marries a black woman, has children with her and lives happily ever after is still a natural racist by virtue of his skin color.  If this were true, then every single white person is, by definition, a racist according to our 'leading scholars.'  Nothing you say or do can ever change that.  Accordingly, there are seminars for white students being held at universities discussing a book entitled 'How to be an Antiracist .'
This, it seems to me, is Martin Luther King, Jr.’s definition of racism on steroids.  (And I don’t buy the cultural Marxist word game that black people cannot be racists because they lack the 'power' to oppress other races). Sinners come in all colors."
Tom DiLorenzo

"After weeks on end of forced isolation, the people are waking up to the control that the government possesses over every area of their lives. Anger is overtaking fear as thousands are disregarding the CDC’s continued pleas to stay at home and avoid crowds. There is no rule of law. Governments can and will act in their own self-interests and continue to view the people as 'the great unwashed' who are not worthy of basic human rights. They can kill us, take away our jobs, our freedoms, and destroy the economy at will. Is it any wonder that the people have lost confidence in their governments?
The chaos is cyclically unfolding on schedule. All confidence in the government has been abandoned due to the draconian measures forced upon the people in such a rash manner that it could not be ignored."
Martin Armstrong

"We too are against police excess.
Yet we are also heart and soul for consistency… and against hypocrisy.
If the streets can throng with protesters without risk of transmission…
Then why not the malls with patrons, why not the restaurants with diners, why not the cinemas with movie-watchers, why not the ballparks with spectators, why not the beaches with swimmers?
Either the virus is a menace demanding universal isolation — or it is not.
You can have it this way. Or you can have it that way.
Yet you cannot have it both this way and that way.
We grant no exceptions."
Brian Maher

"When we turn this corner, a pillar in the argument for an independent Texas will be the ability to steer our own economic course, and to more adeptly and appropriately react to threats to our many industries. Certainly, a free Texas would not have so quickly taken a knee at the alter of federal disaster funding, nor would Austin been so quick to summarily shut down businesses had it not been for  pressure from Washington.  Furthermore, I find it hard to believe that we would be refining Saudi or Russian crude at all on the Gulf Coast, were it not for the questionable alliances of the US. Let us then, throughout this crisis, work to continually build the case for an independent Texas Republic."
Jeff Thomason

"The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself."
Friedrich Nietzsche

"Self-governance, the absence of laws and burden of man-made external force is as close as anyone will be able to approach Perfection. All it takes, of course, is the caveat of Individual Responsibility.  Having no one to blame is a giant step most are unwilling or unable to make."
Brian Wilson

"When any government or political power structure is in place, there is only one option to avoid war, and that is that none submit to the lies of the state, and none participate in the killing of others on orders. Those that would send the children of others to die in war should volunteer to die themselves, but they are the true cowards among us, and always hide in the shadows when the killing they caused begins. They are only capable of handing out medals posthumously to the families of those they used as fodder for their own benefit and political agendas. All in the Executive Branch, all in Congress, all in any fascist political partnerships that profit from war, and all those who claim false intelligence to stoke the fires of conflict, all these and more should be the first and only causalities of any war. No man of worth has the right to ask others to die in his stead for the state."
Gary D. Barnett

"We cannot absolutely prove that those are in error who tell us that society has reached a turning point—that we have seen our best days. But so said all who came before us, and with just as much apparent reason… On what principle is it that, when we see nothing but improvement behind us, we are to expect nothing but deterioration before us?"
Thomas Babington Macaulay

"The powers that be are fond of pointing to the worst government abuse historically on Earth and making claims of moral superiority, but in the end, while the Communist and National Socialist governments in the twentieth century may have harmed their respective populations and those they subdued through war, at least, we have the moral high ground.   Of course, this is much like a getting an Underachiever Award at a serial killer convention.  The entire system of governance is based on violence and nothing else no matter how noble it is portrayed or how many rose petals litter the dais of the King."
Bill Buppert

"It used to be that the government could get away with doing anything it wanted in the name of 'national security.' The other side of the tyrant coin has now been revealed. It must now also be said that the government can get away with doing anything it wants in the name of 'public health'."
Laurence Vance

"Socialism used to be the kiss of death in America until recently among some of us, younger voters, it is said. It is still the kiss of death. Even among many Democrats, there is latent and silent hostility toward going too far. It’s hard to stamp out the American love of freedom and replace it with socialist nonsense and slogans. Even if a superstructure of institutions hostile to freedom, especially the national security and welfare states, now sits atop our society and political system and even if Americans have been educated and propagandized endlessly, the spirit of the Revolution, the spirit of freedom is largely intact. It needs only be aroused and tapped. In the end, freedom will triumph, but not without a conscious effort that propels a transformation toward freedom and away from our embedded institutions of totalitarianism, fascism and socialism."
Michael Rozeff

"To tell people not to be afraid is to give them advice that they cannot take.Our evolved physiological makeup disposes us to fear all sorts of actual and potential threats, even those that exist only in our imagination. The people who have the effrontery to rule us, who call themselves our government, understand this basic fact of human nature. They exploit it, and they cultivate it."
Robert Higgs

"What we have are thousands on the streets who produce nothing, and only consume. They survive on food stamps, various welfare programs, handouts, petty theft, and the like. In other words, they’re not an asset either to themselves or to society. They’re an active liability, and they’re actually encouraged by being allowed to group together on other people’s property.
Will cleaning up after them solve the problem? No, it aggravates it."
Doug Casey

"A castle was not so much a plush palace as the headquarters for a concentration camp. These camps, called feudal kingdoms, were established by conquering barbarians who’d enslaved the local people. When you see one, ask to see not just the stately halls and bedrooms, but the dungeons and torture chambers. A castle was a hangout for silk-clad gangsters who were stealing from helpless workers. The king was the 'lord' who had control of the blackjack; he claimed a special 'divine right' to use force on the innocent. 
Fantasies about handsome princes and beautiful princesses are dangerous; they whitewash the truth. They give children the impression political power is wonderful stuff."
Rick Maybury

"Americans are as politically divided today as they were in the mid-19th century. On the one hand are progressive/socialist/communists who long for stronger federal government and control over every aspect of life. They inhabit the corridors of power on the east and west coasts and the urban centers of the states — primarily state capitols. On the other hand are the people who desire liberty and a small government that doesn't seek to control them but instead seeks to stand aside so they can prosper.
These two philosophies are diametrically opposed. Why shouldn't there be a separation so we can determine which works best for the people?"
Bob Livingston

"The genius of America’s totalitarian system of government is that it is not totally total, and sometimes not very totalitarian at all. It is just total enough. Truly total government–'Your papers, citizen,' stop-and-frisk, permission needed to travel from city to city–might spark revolt. By contrast, a sufficiency of totalitarianism, but not an excess, keeps the populace in adequate torpidity. Thus, done astutely, totalitarianism is hardly noticed."
Fred Reed

"We are fast approaching the stage of the ultimate inversion: the stage where the government is free to do anything it pleases, while the citizens may act only by permission; which is the stage of the darkest periods of human history, the stage of rule by brute force."
Ayn Rand

"It is irrelevant to the entrepreneur, as the servant of the consumers, whether the wishes and wants of the consumers are wise or unwise, moral or immoral. He produces what the consumers want. In this sense he is amoral. He manufactures whiskey and guns just as he produces food and clothing. It is not his task to teach reason to the sovereign consumers. Should one entrepreneur, for ethical reasons of his own, refuse to manufacture whiskey, other entrepreneurs would do so as long as whiskey is wanted and bought. It is not because we have distilleries that people drink whiskey; it is because people like to drink whiskey that we have distilleries. One may deplore this. But it is not up to the entrepreneurs to improve mankind morally. And they are not to be blamed if those whose duty this is have failed to do so."
Ludwig von Mises

"There are moments that define a person’s whole life. Moments in which everything they are and everything they may possibly become balance on a single decision. Life and death, hope and despair, victory and failure teeter precariously on the decision made at that moment. These are moments ungoverned by happenstance, untroubled by luck. These are the moments in which a person earns the right to live, or not."
Jonathan Maberry

"The U.S. government is constantly fabricating 'another Hitler,' whether it is Manuel Noriega, Saddam Hussein, Gaddafi, the Sandinistas, Putin, and myriad others.  Even slicker, however, and a higher level of demagoguery altogether, is to define 'the enemy' as something like 'terror' or 'the invisible enemy' of a virus that no one seems to understand.  Such things can be made to appear to be as common as the air that we breathe (literally, in the case of viruses), so that waging 'war' against them, and the never-ending grabbing hold of more government power and the abolition of whatever is left of freedom, can go on forever."
Tom DiLorenzo