You're sitting fat, dumb, and happy in your lazyboy chair and your dog comes up to you with his rope toy and says, "Let's play tug of war!" and you say, "No."
He barks at you. You say "No" again. He flings the rope toy around like Sid Blumenthal with a small bush pig (albeit Sid can dislocate his jaw for large prey). You yell, "No!"
Dejected, your canine sulks and whines as he looks over his shoulder one more time, expectantly. Your heart melts a bit, but you stand firm and say one more time: "No."
He walks away.
One minute later, he comes back with a slobbered-up sock and says, "Okay, let's play tug of war with this!"
This is called "negotiating in the spirit of bipartisanship."
-- Jonah Goldberg, "The Trouble with Bipartisanship", June 2001
If some hemptivist tells you that violence never solved anything, make like a pimp and bitch-slap him every time he tries to reason with you ("That wasn't necessary..." Whap! "Seriously, cut that out!" Whip-whap!) until he finally tries to defend himself. Then say, "See."
-- Jonah Goldberg
To assume the mantle of "reasonableness" -- as Lindorff does -- by conceding that Bush isn't as good an orator as Hitler was, is to claim soundness of mind by conceding that a clock doesn't melt because vests have no sleeves.
-- Jonah Goldberg, on Bush/Hitler comparisons
Indeed, considering all the problems with young people -- chief among them gratuitous exuberance and ignorance -- you could claim that whoever has the most young followers is more likely to have the worse arguments. For example, I bet you anything I could destroy Milton Friedman in a debate about economics -- so long as the audience was comprised of five year olds. He may have a Nobel Prize, but I can make offensive sounds with my armpit. Advantage: Goldberg!
-- Jonah Goldberg
Nothing disappoints a revolutionary more than the persistent lack of injustice.
-- Jonah Goldberg, "Back to Realpolitik", April 2001
"...there is a time for peace and talk and reason; and then, at long last, and only with sadness of heart and mournful admission that all your wisdom and words have failed, you must go kill you some motherfuckers and set some of their shit on fire."
-- Ghandi, paraphrased by David Wong
We fight wars not to have peace, but to have a peace worth having. Slavery is peace. Tyranny is peace. For that matter, genocide is peace when you get right down to it. The historical consequences of a philosophy predicated on the notion of no war at any cost are families flying to the Super Bowl accompanied by three or four trusted slaves and a Europe devoid of a single living Jew.
-- Bill Whittle
Yes, we were the tolerant ones. We deplored the fact that people were judged by their hair length; yet, we ridiculed those who wore their hair too short. We bemoaned the fact that clothes mattered; so we all dressed alike and called it individuality.
-- Dan Pressnell, "Flower Children and the Hand-Me-Down World"
Everywhere I went, I heard "never again." Steven Spielberg's "Schindler's List" had been a smash hit. The Holocaust Museum had opened on the Mall in Washington. College seminars were taught on the "lessons" of the singular crime of the twentieth century. But why, I wondered, had nobody applied those lessons to the atrocities of the 1990s: the systematic murder of 200,000 Bosnian civilians in Europe between 1992 and 1995 and the extermination of some 800,000 Rwandan Tutsi in 1994. Did Never Again simply mean "never again will Germans kill Jews in Europe between 1939 and 1945?"
-- Samantha Power, Baccalaureate Address, 1 June 2002
The World as we know it will likely be ruined by the year 2000...World food production cannot keep pace with the galloping population. Family Planning cannot and will not, in the foreseeable future, check this runaway growth.
-- Environmental Fund advert, 1975, quoted from Walter Williams, "Elite Costs"
If I were a gambler, I would take even money that England will not exist in the year 2000.
-- Paul Ehrlich, attributed, 1970, quoted from Michael Fumento, "The Profits Of Doom"
To feed a starving child is to exacerbate the world population problem.
-- Lamont Cole (environmentalist nut), quoted from "In Gaia We Trust", Monthly Planet, February 2003
Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or ill it teaches the whole people by its example. If the government becomes the law breaker, it breeds contempt for laws; it invites every man to become a law unto himself.
-- Justice Brandeis
Person who say it cannot be done should not interrupt person doing it.
-- Chinese proverb
Sacred cows make the best burgers.
-- Mayor Steve Goldsmith (Indianapolis)
A lantern is of no use to a bat, and good teaching is lost on the man who will not learn. Reason is folly with the unreasonable.
-- Charles H. Spurgeon
Let us oppose their teaching by all scriptural and intelligent means, but let us respect their courage in plainly giving us their views. I hate their doctrine, but I love their honesty; and as they speak but what they believe to be true, let them speak it out, and the more clearly the better. Out with it, sirs, be it what it may, but do let us know what you mean.
For my part, I love to stand foot to foot with an honest foeman. To open warfare, bold and true hearts raise no objections but the ground of quarrel. It is rather covert enmity which we have most cause to fear and best reason to loathe. That crafty kindness which inveigles me to sacrifice principle is the serpent in the grass -- deadly to the incautious wayfarer.
-- Charles H. Spurgeon, "Baptismal Regeneration"
Which shall we wonder at most, the endurance of the faithful or the cruelty of their tormentors? Is it not proven beyond all dispute that there is no limit to the enormities which men will commit when they are once persuaded that they are keepers of other men's consciences? To spread religion by any means, and to crush heresy by all means is the practical inference from the doctrine that one man may control another's religion. Given the duty of a state to foster some one form of faith, and by the sure inductions of our nature slowly but certainly persecution will occur. To prevent for ever the possibility of Papists roasting Protestants, Anglicans hanging Romish priests, and Puritans flogging Quakers, let every form of state-churchism be utterly abolished, and the remembrance of the long curse which it has cast upon the world be blotted out for ever.
-- Charles H. Spurgeon, "The Inquisition", Sword and Trowel, August 1868
Our Sentiments are uniformly on the side of Religious Liberty -- That Religion is at all times and places a matter between God and individuals -- That no man ought to suffer in name, person, or effects on account of his religious Opinions - That the legitimate Power of civil government extends no further than to punish the man who works ill to his neighbor[.]
-- Letter from The Danbury Baptist Association to Thomas Jefferson, October 7th, 1801
It is the highest impertinence and presumption, therefore, in kings and ministers to pretend to watch over the economy of private people, and to restrain their expense, either by sumptuary laws, or by prohibiting the importation of foreign luxuries. They are themselves always, and without any exception, the greatest spendthrifts in the society. Let them look well after their own expense, and they may safely trust private people with theirs. If their own extravagance does not ruin the state, that of the subject never will.
-- Adam Smith, "The Wealth of Nations"
But man has almost constant occasion for the help of his brethren, and it is in vain for him to expect it from their benevolence only. He will be more likely to prevail if he can interest their self-love in his favour, and shew them that it is for their own advantage to do for him what he requires of them. Whoever offers to another a bargain of any kind, proposes to do this. Give me that which I want, and you shall have this which you want, is the meaning of every such offer; and it is in this manner that we obtain from one another the far greater part of those good offices which we stand in need of. It is not from the benevolence of the butcher the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity, but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities, but of their advantages.
-- Adam Smith, "The Wealth of Nations"
There is nothing wrong with identifying problems and mishaps in a predominantly successful system if one does so with the constructive intent of rectifying or alleviating them. But someone who condemns the system as such is obligated to answer this question: What political and economic system could manage things better?
-- Johan Norberg, "In Defense Of Global Capitalism", p. 98
Some people seem to think that the answer to all life's imperfections is to create a government agency to correct them. If this is your approach, then go straight to totalitarianism. Do not pass "Go." Do not collect $200.
-- Thomas Sowell, "Controversial Essays"
The strongest argument for socialism is that it sounds good. The strongest argument against socialism is that it doesn't work. But those who live by words will always have a soft spot in their hearts for socialism because it sounds so good.
-- Thomas Sowell -- "Controversial Essays"
The past is many things, but one thing it is, is irrevocable. A past to your liking is not an entitlement.
-- Thomas Sowell, "Multicultural Education" speech
The assumption that spending more of the taxpayer's money will make things better has survived all kinds of evidence that it has made things worse. The black family -- which survived slavery, discrimination, poverty, wars and depressions -- began to come apart as the federal government moved in with its well-financed programs to 'help.'
-- Thomas Sowell
If it ain't broke, don't fix it -- and, especially, don't let politicians fix it.
-- Thomas Sowell
If you have always believed that everyone should play by the same rules and be judged by the same standards, that would have gotten you labelled a radical 60 years ago, a liberal 30 years ago and a racist today.
-- Thomas Sowell, "Random Thoughts", April 1999
Doing the right thing is fun. If nothing else, it surprises people.
-- Thomas Sowell, "Random Thoughts", December 2001
Everyone is for a beneficial outcome; they simply define it in radically different terms. Everyone is a "progressive" by his own lights. That the anointed believe that this label differentiates themselves from other people is one of a number of symptoms of their naive narcissism.
-- Thomas Sowell, "The Vision of the Anointed", p. 95
Of course there are non-economic values. In fact, there are only non-economic values. Economics is not a value in and of itself. It is only a way of weighing one value against another...What lofty talk about "non-economic values" usually boils down to is that some people do not want their own particular values weighed against anything.
-- Thomas Sowell, "Basic Economics", pp. 305-306
There's a tendency to think that if something is good we ought to subsidize it. And in fact, frankly, nothing is good categorically. It is good within some range and at some price and so on, and the way to find out how good it is, is precisely not to subsidize it and to let the market decide how good it is. Because if you're going to subsidize it, you may do many things that make no sense.
-- Thomas Sowell, interview with Region, 2001
How complete a non sequitur [the dependence effect] represents is seen most clearly if we apply the argument to any product of the arts, be it music, painting, or literature. If the fact that people would not feel the need for something if it were not produced did prove that such products are of small value, all those highest products of human endeavor would be of small value. Professor Galbraith's argument could be easily employed, without any change of the essential terms, to demonstrate the worthlessness of literature or any other form of art. Surely an individual's want for literature is not original with himself in the sense that he would experience it if literature were not produced. Does this then mean that the production of literature cannot be defended as satisfying a want because it is only the production, which provokes the demand?
-- Frederick A. Hayek, "The Non-Sequitur of the Dependence Effect", Southern Economic Journal, Vol. 27, 1961
The advocates of totalitarian control call the attitudes of their opponents negativism. They pretend that while they themselves are demanding the improvement of unsatisfactory conditions, the others are intent upon letting the evils endure. This is to judge all social questions from the viewpoint of narrow-minded bureaucrats. Only to bureaucrats can the idea occur that establishing new offices, promulgating new decrees, and increasing the number of government employees alone can be described as positive and beneficial measures, whereas everything else is passivity and quietism.
-- Ludwig von Mises, "Omnipotent Government: The Rise Of The Total State And Total War", p. v
I should like to know if taking this old Declaration of Independence, which declares that all men are equal upon principle and making exceptions to it where will it stop. If one man says it does not mean a Negro, why not another say it does not mean some other man?
-- Abraham Lincoln, quoted from Ronald Reagan, "Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation", Human Life Review, Spring 1983
The true test of one's commitment to freedom of choice does not come when one allows others to choose in ways he deems right. The true test comes when one permits others to choose in ways he finds objectionable.
-- Walter Williams, "Discrimination and Liberty", April 1998
Freedom is not empowerment. Empowerment is what the Serbs have in Bosnia. Anybody can grab a gun and be empowered. It's not entitlement. An entitlement is what people on welfare get, and how free are they? It's not an endlessly expanding list of rights -- the "right" to education, the "right" to health care, the "right" to food and housing. That's not freedom, that's dependency. Those aren't rights, those are the rations of slavery -- hay and a barn for human cattle.
There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences.
-- P.J. O'Rourke, "The Liberty Manifesto"
Whenever someone starts talking about "fair competition" or indeed, about "fairness" in general, it is time to keep a sharp eye on your wallet, for it is about to be picked. For the genuinely "fair" is simply the voluntary terms of exchange, mutually agreed upon by buyer and seller.
-- Murray Rothbard, "Protectionism and the Destruction of Prosperity", 1986
Nothing offends the doctrinaire intellectual as our ability to achieve the momentous in a matter-of-fact way, unblessed by words.
-- Eric Hoffer
The only thing a bully understands is a fist in the face instead of a shake of the hand and meaningless signatures on documents recording promises they never intend to honor.
-- Cal Thomas, on diplomacy
If there is no struggle there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one; or it may be a physical one; or it may be both moral and physical; but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without demand. It never did and it never will.
-- Frederick Douglass, letter, 1849
I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.
-- Barry Goldwater, 1964 acceptance speech
However, on religious issues there can be little or no compromise. There is no position on which people are so immovable as their religious beliefs. There is no more powerful ally one can claim in a debate than Jesus Christ, or God, or Allah, or whatever one calls this supreme being. But like any powerful weapon, the use of God's name on one's behalf should be used sparingly. The religious factions that are growing throughout our land are not using their religious clout with wisdom. They are trying to force government leaders into following their position 100 percent. If you disagree with these religious groups on a particular moral issue, they complain, they threaten you with a loss of money or votes or both. I'm frankly sick and tired of the political preachers across this country telling me as a citizen that if I want to be a moral person, I must believe in "A," "B," "C," and "D." Just who do they think they are? And from where do they presume to claim the right to dictate their moral beliefs to me? And I am even more angry as a legislator who must endure the threats of every religious group who thinks it has some God-granted right to control my vote on every roll call in the Senate. I am warning them today: I will fight them every step of the way if they try to dictate their moral convictions to all Americans in the name of "conservatism."
-- Senator Barry Goldwater, from the Congressional Record, September 16, 1981
Our towns and our cities, then our counties, then our states, then our regional contacts - and only then, the national government. That, let me remind you, is the ladder of liberty, built by decentralized power.
-- Barry Goldwater, 1964 acceptance speech
Those who seek absolute power, even though they seek it to do what they regard as good, are simply demanding the right to enforce their own version of heaven on earth. And let me remind you, they are the very ones who always create the most hellish tyrannies.
-- Barry Goldwater, 1964 acceptance speech
To some, foul language is offensive. For me there are political ideas that I find far more offensive than any dirty joke I've ever heard. The phrase 'President Hillary Clinton' immediately comes to mind.
-- Neal Boortz
When you see ten problems rolling down the road, if you don't do anything, nine of them will roll into a ditch before they get to you.
-- Calvin Coolidge
The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of misery.
-- Winston Churchill
You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life.
-- Winston Churchill
Sometimes the first duty of intelligent men, is the restatement of the obvious.
-- George Orwell
Since pacifists have more freedom of action in countries where traces of democracy remain, pacifism can act more effectively against democracy than for it. Objectively, the pacifist is pro-Nazi.
-- George Orwell
If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face -- for ever.
-- O'Brien, "Nineteen Eighty-Four" (George Orwell)
Every major horror of history has been committed in the name of an altruistic motive. Has any act of selfishness ever equalled the carnage perpetrated by the disciples of altruism? Hardly.
-- Ayn Rand
To those of you who received honors, awards and distinctions, I say, well done. And to the C students, I say to you: you, too, can be president of the United States.
-- George W. Bush
The genuine appreciation of a heritage stands in stark contrast to those who would divide people into groups for political purposes. There is a trend in this country to put people into boxes ... There are such boxes all over the world in places like Kosovo, Bosnia, Rwanda -- and they are human tragedies.
-- George W. Bush, 1999
There is a dividing line in our world, not between nations, and not between religions or cultures, but a dividing line separating two visions of justice and the value of life. On a tape claiming responsibility for the atrocities in Madrid, a man is heard to say, "We choose death, while you choose life." We don't know if this is the voice of the actual killers, but we do know it expresses the creed of the enemy. It is a mindset that rejoices in suicide, incites murder and celebrates every death we mourn. And we who stand on the other side of the line must be equally clear and certain of our convictions. We do love life, the life given to us and to all. We believe in the values that uphold the dignity of life, tolerance and freedom, and the right of conscience. And we know that this way of life is worth defending. There is no neutral ground -- no neutral ground -- in the fight between civilization and terror, because there is no neutral ground between good and evil, freedom and slavery, and life and death.
-- George W. Bush, 2004 speech at the White House
Normally, when you integrate almost 5MB of patches, bad things happen. This time, a miracle occurred. As I uploaded the resultant kernel, a specter of the holy penguin appeared before me, and said "It is Good. It is Bugfree".
In short, not only are most of Alan's patches integrated, I have it on higher authority that the result is perfect.
So if it doesn't compile for you, you must be doing something wrong.
-- Linus Torvalds, announcing Linux 2.4.0
Almost everything in ACPI is transparent, until it does not work. That is usually when you as a user will know there is something not working properly.
-- The FreeBSD Handbook
Some people, when confronted with a problem, think "I know, I'll use regular expressions." Now they have two problems.
-- Jamie Zawinsky
On the plus side, it's a lot easier in general to find /usr/include than cpp.
-- Larry Wall
Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not tried it.
-- Donald Knuth
What on earth would it mean to compare an object you created with another object from someone else's code unless you knew exactly what each object's semantics were? Do you really want to ask if my abstract syntax tree is less then your HTTP connection object?
-- Jeremy Hylton
...let me just say that my least-favourite Python error message is "SyntaxError: invalid syntax", which somehow manages to be overly terse and redundant at the same time.
-- Greg Ward
lp1 on fire
-- Linux
AMAZING FREE OFFER. We'll give you a COMPAQ DESKPRO 286 ABSOLUTELY FREE when you give us 3,694.99 pounds.
-- Old Compaq advert
Win2K is every bit as fast as NT - you just need more RAM and a faster CPU.
-- unknown Microsoft customer, quoted from radsoft.net
Modern cyberspace is a deadly festering swamp, teeming with dangerous programs such as "viruses," "worms," "Trojan horses" and "licensed Microsoft software" that can take over your computer and render it useless.
-- Dave Barry
Winters here, and you feel lousy: Youre coughing and sneezing; your muscles ache; your nose is an active mucus volcano. These symptoms -- so familiar at this time of year -- can mean only one thing: Tiny fanged snails are eating your brain.
-- Dave Barry
But merely watching infomercials will not get you into shape. For that, you need to take real action, which is why I also purchased an issue of Men's Fitness magazine.
-- Dave Barry
WARNING: DO NOT ATTEMPT THE FOLLOWING EXPERIMENT YOURSELF. THIS IS A DANGEROUS EXPERIMENT CONDUCTED BY A TRAINED HUMOR COLUMNIST UNDER CAREFULLY CONTROLLED CONDITIONS, NAMELY, HIS WIFE WAS NOT HOME.
-- Dave Barry
My grandad always used to say, "If you see a blind man in the street, kick him to the ground and steal his lunch. For who are you to be more merciful than God?"
-- Sean Lock, "15 Minutes Of Misery"
This morning I got a letter from Oxfam, showing me a photograph of all the people that would die if I didn't send them any money. That's illegal, isn't it?
-- Sean Lock, "15 Minutes Of Misery"
I've been portrayed as a caveman by some. That's not true. I'm a conservative progressive, and that means I think all men are equal, be they slants, beaners or niggers.
-- Jesse Helms
This ambiguity is another example of a growing problem with mathematical notation: There aren't enough squiggles to go around.
-- Jim Blinn
Vegetables are what food eats. Fruit are vegetables that fool you by tasting good. Fish are fast moving vegetables. Mushrooms are what grows on vegetables when food's done with them.
-- Meat Eater's Credo, according to Jim Williams
2. Pointless Waste of Time.com is an online "humor" magazine run by my client, David Wong. It is similar to Modern Humorist, in that it is also on the internet and is programmed in HTML.
-- David Wong, "My lawsuit against Modern Humorist", http://www.pointlesswasteoftime.com/lawsuit.html
The time has come for us to acknowledge that any "Christianity" that needs a sword to ensure its permanence, and that promises peace only when the "good guys" have the artillery, is not Christianity.
-- Rick Miesel, "Notes on Reconstructionism", p. 9