âRepublics never survive, for their people do not like freedom but prefer to be led and guided and flattered and seduced into slavery by a benevolent, or not so, benevolent despot. They want to worship Caesar. So, American republicanism will inevitably die and become a democracy, and then decline, as Aristotle said into a despotism.â
âIt is a stern fact of history that no nation that rushed to the abyss ever turned back. Not ever, in the long history of the world. We are now on the edge of the abyss. Can we, for the first time in history, turn back? It is up to you."
âMankind adores its betrayers, and murders its saviors.â
In great empires the people who live in the capital, and in the provinces remote from the scene of action, feel, many of them, scarce any inconveniency from the war; but enjoy, at their ease, the amusement of reading in the newspapers the exploits of their own fleets and armies. To them this amusement compensates the small difference between the taxes which they pay on account of the war, and those which they had been accustomed to pay in time of peace. They are commonly dissatisfied with the return of peace, which puts an end to their amusement, and to a thousand visionary hopes of conquest and national glory from a longer continuance of the war. ~ Adam Smith
Hear!
(..and we all have known this.. from the start.)
In great empires the people who live in the capital, and in the provinces remote from the scene of action, feel, many of them, scarce any inconveniency from the war; but enjoy, at their ease, the amusement of reading in the newspapers the exploits of their own fleets and armies. To them this amusement compensates the small difference between the taxes which they pay on account of the war, and those which they had been accustomed to pay in time of peace. They are commonly dissatisfied with the return of peace, which puts an end to their amusement, and to a thousand visionary hopes of conquest and national glory from a longer continuance of the war. ~ Adam Smith
"I do not believe that the solution to our problem is simply to elect the right people. The important thing is to establish a political climate of opinion which will make it politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing. Unless it is politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing, the right people will not do the right thing either, or if they try, they will shortly be out of office."
"Music should be holy. When it becomes a business and the music is designed to make money, then the music doesn't do what it's supposed to do."
~ Jerry Garcia ~
âBill Walton was truly one of a kind,â NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said in a statement. âAs a Hall of Fame player, he redefined the center position. His unique all-around skills made him a dominant force at UCLA and led to an NBA regular-season and Finals MVP, two NBA championships and a spot on the NBAâs 50th and 75th Anniversary Teams.
Bill then translated his infectious enthusiasm and love for the game to broadcasting, where he delivered insightful and colorful commentary which entertained generations of basketball fans.
But what I will remember most about him was his zest for life. He was a regular presence at league events â always upbeat, smiling ear to ear and looking to share his wisdom and warmth. I treasured our close friendship, envied his boundless energy and admired the time he took with every person he encountered.â
Every day Wooden would fill the heads of his players with ideas that would help them in life â not just on the court. âTo this day,â says Walton, âI have John Wooden quotes on and around my desk â and also the John Wooden Pyramid of Success.â Bill Walton goes into more detail about his relationship with the legendary UCLA basketball coach and his favorite John Wooden quotes in his bestselling autobiography: Back from the Dead.
-The Seven-Point Creed:
-Be true to yourself
-Make each day your masterpiece
-Help others
-Drink deeply from good books
-Make friendship a fine art
-Build a shelter against a rainy day
-Pray for guidance and give thanks for your blessings every day
It was miraculous. It was almost no trick at all, he saw, to turn vice into virtue and slander into truth, impotence into abstinence, arrogance into humility, plunder into philanthropy, thievery into honor, blasphemy into wisdom, brutality into patriotism, and sadism into justice. Anybody could do it; it required no brains at all. It merely required no character.
And now, once again, I bid my hideous progeny go forth and prosper. I have an affection for it, for it was the offspring of happy days, when death and grief were but words, which found no true echo in my heart.
Elegance is inferior to virtue.
But I am a blasted tree; the bolt has entered my soul; and I felt then that I should survive to exhibit what I shall soon cease to be - a miserable spectacle of wrecked humanity, pitiable to others and intolerable to myself.
Elegance is inferior to virtue.
Every political good carried to the extreme must be productive of evil.
A local here celebrating his 108th birthday today said
'close your eyes and dream when you go to bed tonight but remember to keep breathing or you will wake up dead '
