[Marxism] Compendium of quotations

["Craven, Jim" <JCraven@xxxxxxxxx>]

"We are the ruling race of the world. . . . We will not renounce our
part in the mission of our race, trustee, under God, of the civilization
of the world. . . . He has marked us as his chosen people. . . . He has
made us adept in government that we may administer government among
savage and senile peoples." : Sen. Alfred Beveridge 

"I firmly believe that when any territory outside the present
territorial limits of the United States becomes necessary for our
defense or essential for our commercial development, we ought to lose no
time in acquiring it." : Sen. Orville Platt of Connecticut 1894.

"Between 1898 and 1934, the Marines invaded Cuba 4 times, Nicaragua 5
times, Honduras 7 times, the Dominican Republic 4 times, Haiti twice,
Guatemala once, Panama twice, Mexico 3 times and Columbia 4 times,"
Washington has intervened militarily in foreign countries more than 200
times."

"If the people are not convinced (that the Free World is in mortal
danger) it would be impossible for Congress to vote the vast sums now
being spent to avert danger. With the support of public opinion, as
marshalled by the press, we are off to a good start. It is our Job -
yours and mine -- to keep our people convinced that the only way to keep
disaster away from our shores is to build up America's might." --
Charles Wilson, Chairman of the Board of General Electric and Truman
appointee to head the Office of Defence Mobilization, in a speech to the
Newspaper Publishers Association, 1950 

It is a tragic mix-up when the United States spends $500,000 for every
enemy soldier killed, and only $53 annually on the victims of poverty:
Martin Luther King, Jr: 1929-1968

"Youth is the first victim of war; the first fruit of peace. It takes 20
years or more of peace to make a man; it takes only 20 seconds of war to
destroy him." : -King Baudouin I: King of Belgium 

"Today's human rights violations are the causes of tomorrow's
conflicts." Mary Robinson: United Nations High Commissioner for Human
Rights (Retired) 

"Misunderstanding arising from ignorance breeds fear, and fear remains
the greatest enemy of peace." : Lester B. Pearson 

"Cowardice asks the question: is it safe? Expediency asks the question:
is it politic? Vanity asks the question: is it popular? But conscience
asks the question: is it right? And there comes a time when one must
take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular- but one
must take it simply because it is right." : Martin Luther King Jr.
1929-1968

"Today the real test of power is not capacity to make war but capacity
to prevent it." : Anne O'Hare McCormick: First woman to win a Pulitzer
Prize in journalism for her work as a foreign correspondent. 

If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of
fighting a foreign enemy: James Madison: US fourth president, 1751-1836

The welfare of the people in particular has always been the alibi of
tyrants, and it provides the further advantage of giving the servants of
tyranny a good conscience: Albert Camus: French novelist, essayist, and
playwright.1957 Nobel Prize for Literature. 1913-1960

A great wave of oppressive tyranny isn't going to strike, but rather a
slow seepage of oppressive laws and regulations from within will sink
the American dream of liberty: George Baumler

The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the
instruments of tyranny at home: James Madison: US fourth president,
1751-1836

This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when he first
appears he is a protector: Plato: Ancient Greek philosopher
(428/427-348/347 B.C.)

I was provided with additional input that was radically different from
the truth. I assisted in furthering that version: Oliver North 

To be persuasive we must be believable; to be believable we must be
credible; to be credible we must be truthful: Edward R. Murrow =

Fear is not in the habit of speaking truth: Publius Cornelius Tacitus 

The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap
between one's real and one's declared aims, one turns, as it were,
instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish
squirting out ink: George Orwell : English novelist, essayist, and
critic, 1903-1950

"It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate,
tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds.": Samuel
Adams

"Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to
conscience, above all liberties.": John Milton

"For those who stubbornly seek freedom, there can be no more urgent task
than to come to understand the mechanisms and practices of
indoctrination. These are easy to perceive in the totalitarian
societies, much less so in the system of 'brainwashing under freedom' to
which we are subjected and in which all too often we serve as unwilling
instruments." Noam Chomsky 

"Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience.
Our problem is that numbers of people all over the world have obeyed the
dictates of the leaders of their government and have gone to war, and
millions have been killed because of this obedience. Our problem is that
people are obedient all over the world in the face of poverty and
starvation and stupidity, and war, and cruelty. Our problem is that
people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves, and all
the while the grand thieves are running and robbing the country. That's
our problem.": Howard Zinn, from 'Failure to Quit'

Dignity consists not in possessing honors, but in the consciousness that
we deserve them: Aristotle

It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and
moral courage so rare: Mark Twain

It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give
validity to his convictions in political affairs: Albert Einstein

Say nothing of my religion. It is known to God and myself alone. Its
evidence before the world is to be sought in my life: if it has been
honest and dutiful to society the religion which has regulated it cannot
be a bad one: Thomas Jefferson

Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it
is a dangerous servant and a fearful master: George Washington

The genius of our ruling class is that it has kept a majority of the
people from ever questioning the inequity of a system where most people
drudge along, paying heavy taxes for which they get nothing in return:
Gore Vidal

For in reason, all government without the consent of the governed is the
very definition of slavery: Jonathan Swift

Here is my first principle of foreign policy: good government at home:
William Ewart Gladstone

The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their
neutrality in times of moral crisis: Dante Alighieri

Politics: A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles.
The conduct of public affairs for private advantage: Ambrose Bierce

When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one
by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle: Edmund Burke

The world will never have lasting peace so long as men reserve for war
the finest human qualities. Peace, no less than war, requires idealism
and self-sacrifice and a righteous and dynamic faith: John Foster Dulles

Truth is not determined by majority vote: Doug Gwyn

"If those in charge of our society - politicians, corporate executives,
and owners of press and television - can dominate our ideas, they will
be secure in their power. They will not need soldiers patrolling the
streets. We will control ourselves.": Howard Zinn, historian and author

Why is this man in the White House? The majority of Americans did not
vote for him. Why is he there? And I tell you this morning that he's in
the White House because God put him there for a time such as this: Lt
Gen William Boykin, speaking of G. W. Bush, New York Times, 17 October
2003

God gave the savior to the German people. We have faith, deep and
unshakeable faith, that he was sent to us by God to save Germany.
Hermann Goering, speaking of Hitler

If this were a dictatorship, it would be a heck of a lot easier - just
so long as I'm the dictator. George W. Bush, 18 December 2000

International law? I better call my lawyer; he didn't bring that up to
me; George W. Bush, 12 December 2003

Liberty can not be preserved without general knowledge among people."
(August 1765) John Adams 

War is fear cloaked in courage: William Westmoreland

Liberty and democracy become unholy when their hands are dyed red with
innocent blood: Gandhi, Non-violence in Peace and War, 1948

Man has no right to kill his brother. It is no excuse that he does so in
uniform: he only adds the infamy of servitude to the crime of murder:
Percy Bysshe Shelley, "A Declaration of Rights"

Anyone who has ever looked into the glazed eyes of a soldier dying on
the battlefield will think hard before starting a war. Otto Von Bismark

" Do not worry over the charge of treason to your masters, but be
concerned about the treason that involves yourselves. Be true to
yourself and you cannot be a traitor to any good cause on Earth." :
Eugene V. Debs, Speech, June 16, 1918 

"How is a military drilled and trained to defend freedom, peace and
ahppiness? This is what Major General O'Ryan has to say of an
efficiently trained generation: 'The soldier must be so trained that he
becomes a mere automoton; he must be so trained that it will destroy his
initiative; he must be so trained that he is turned into a machine. The
soldier must be forced into the military noose; he must be jacked up; he
must be ruled by his superiors with pistol in hand.' This was not said
by a Prussian Junker; not by a German barbarian . . . but by an American
major general. And he is right. You cannot conduct war with equals; you
cannot have militarism with free born men; you must have slaves,
automotons, machines, obedient disciplined creatures, who will move,
act, shoot and kill at the command of their superiors. That is
preparedness, and nothing else." : Emma Goldman, Preparedness: The Road
to Universal Slaughter 

"The so-called Christian virtues of humility, love, charity, personal
freedom, the strong prohibitions against violence, murder, stealing,
lying, cruelty-all these are washed away by war. The greatest hero is
the one who kills the most people. Glamorous exploits in successful
lying and mass stealing and heroic vengeance are rewarded with
decorations and public acclaim." : John T. Flynn, As We Go Marching 

After every ''victory'' you have more enemies: Jeanette Winterson

"The guns and the bombs, the rockets and the warships, are all symbols
of human failure." : Lyndon B Johnson 

"Sure, there were lots of bodies we never identified. You know what a
direct hit by a shell does to a guy. Or a mine, or a solid hit with a
grenade, even. Sometimes all we have is a leg or a hunk of arm. The ones
that stink the worst are the guys who got internal wounds and are dead
about three weeks with the blood staying inside and rotting, and when
you move the body the blood comes out of the nose and mouth. Then some
of them bloat up in the sun, they bloat up so big that they bust the
buttons and then they get blue and the skin peels. They don't all get
blue, some of them get black. But they all stunk. There's only one stink
and that's it. You never get used to it, either. As long as you live,
you never get used to it. And after a while, the stink gets in your
clothes and you can taste it in your mouth. You know what I think? I
think maybe if every civilian in the world could smell this stink, then
maybe we wouldn't have any more wars." : -Technical Sergeant Donald
Hagua! ll, 48th Quartermaster Graves Registration (quoted in Purnell's
History of the Second World War) 

Mark Twain: The War Prayer : O Lord our God, help us to tear their
soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their
smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to
drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded,
writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a
hurricane of fire;

"The industrial way of life leads to the industrial way of death. From
Shiloh to Dachau, from Antietam to Stalingrad, from Hiroshima to Vietnam
and Afghanistan, the great specialty of industry and technology has been
the mass production of human corpses." -Edward Abbey 

"The death of a single human being is too heavy a price for the
vindication of any principle, however sacred." -Daniel Berrigan 

No one can terrorize a whole nation, unless we are all his accomplices.
(about Senator Joseph McCarthy's accusations about Communism in the
American government) Edward R. Murrow: 

You do not become a "dissident" just because you decide one day to take
up this most unusual career. You are thrown into it by your personal
sense of responsibility, combined with a complex set of external
circumstances. You are cast out of the existing structures and placed in
a position of conflict with them. It begins as an attempt to do your
work well, and ends with being branded an enemy of society: Vaclav
Havel: 

Thou shalt not be a victim. Thou shalt not be a perpetrator. Above all,
thou shalt not be a bystander: Holocaust Museum, Washington, DC: 

"So let us regard this as settled: what is morally wrong can never be
advantageous, even when it enables you to make some gain that you
believe to be to your advantage. The mere act of believing that some
wrongful course of action constitutes an advantage is pernicious."
Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 B.C.)

"And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but
considerst not the beam that is in thine own eye?" Bible, Matthew 7:3

"Not the faults of others, nor what others have done or left undone, but
one's own deeds, done and left undone, should one consider.": 50th
Stanza from the Dhammapada (The Path of Wisdom)

"Believers, let not a group of you mock another. Perhaps they are better
than you. - - - Let not one of you find faults in another nor let anyone
of you defame another.": Holy Quran, Chapter 49:11 (Al-Hujarat)

"You see in others what you actually see in yourself.": The Guru
Dronacharya in Mahabharata

"I went in search of a bad person; I found none as I, seeing myself,
found me the worst.": Kabir, Saint Poet of North India

I wonder whether there is any one in this generation who accepts
reproof, for if one says to him: Remove the mote from between your eyes,
he would answer: Remove the beam from between your eyes!: Talmud:
Baraitha: Rashi (1050-1115 AD) quoting Rabbi Tarfon

It is easy to see the faults of others, but not so easy to see one's own
faults: Gautama Buddha (563 - 483 BC)

All those who seek to destroy the liberties of a democratic nation ought
to know that war is the surest and shortest means to accomplish it:
Alexis de Tocqueville

He therefore is the truest friend to the liberty of his country who
tries most to promote its virtue, and who, so far as his power and
influence extend, will not suffer a man to be chosen into any office of
power and trust who is not a wise and virtuous man...: Samuel Adams

Throughout the history of the United States, war has been the primary
impetus behind the growth and development of the central state. It has
been the lever by which presidents and other national officials have
bolstered the power of the state in the face of tenacious popular
resistance: Bruce D. Porter

The first half of the night, think of your own faults, the second half,
the faults of others when you are asleep. Chinese proverb: 

To judge from the history of mankind, we shall be compelled to conclude,
that the fiery and destructive passions of war, reign in the human
breast, with much more powerful sway, than the mild and beneficent
sentiments of peace: Alexander Hamilton

The constitutional right of free speech has been declared to be the same
in peace and war. In peace, too, men may differ widely as to what
loyalty to our country demands, and an intolerant majority, swayed by
passion or by fear, may be prone in the future, as it has been in the
past, to stamp as disloyal opinions with which it disagrees: Louis D.
Brandeis 

We are reluctant to admit that we owe our liberties to men of a type
that today we hate and fear -- unruly men, disturbers of the peace, men
who resent and denounce what Whitman called 'the insolence of elected
persons' -- in a word, free men.: Gerald W. Johnson

Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in
government. And paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is
the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the
people: Black Hugo L.

As I watch government at all levels daily eat away at our freedom, I
keep thinking how prosperity and government largesse have combined to
make most of us fat and lazy and indifferent to, or actually in favor
of, the limits being placed on that freedom: Lyn Nofziger 

Those in possession of absolute power can not only prophesy and make
their prophecies come true, but they can also lie and make their lies
come true: Eric Hoffer

Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge
is shipwrecked by the laughter of the Gods: Albert Einstein: 

There is no absolute knowledge. And those who claim it, whether they are
scientists or dogmatists, open the door to tragedy. All information is
imperfect. We have to treat it with humility: J. Bronowski

The things that will destroy us are: politics without principle;
pleasure without conscience; wealth without work; knowledge without
character; business without morality; science without humanity; and
worship without sacrifice: Mahatma Mohandas K. Gandhi

During war, the laws are silent: Cicero Quintus Tullius

One is left with the horrible feeling now that war settles nothing; that
to win a war is as disastrous as to lose one: Agatha Christie: 

The peace and welfare of this and coming generations of Americans will
be secure only as we cling to the watchword of true patriotism: "Our
country -- when right to be kept right; when wrong to be put right.":
Carl Schurz: 

Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of principles: Ralph Waldo
Emerson: 

Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking.
There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked
solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think: Martin
Luther King Jr., "Strength to Love", 1963

I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him
is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in
order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is
in reality expressing the highest respect for law: Martin Luther King
Jr., "Letter From Birmingham Jail", 4.16.63

In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the
silence of our friends: Martin Luther King Jr., "The Trumpet of
Conscience", 1967

A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military
defense: than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual
doom: Martin Luther King Jr., "The Trumpet of Conscience", 1967

"Modern fascism should be properly called corporatism, since it is the
merger of state, military and corporate power.": Benito Mussolini

"Nothing doth more hurt in a state than that cunning men pass for
wise.": Sir Francis Bacon

Whatever you do, you need courage. Whatever course you decide upon,
there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong. There are always
difficulties arising that tempt you to believe your critics are right.
To map out a course of action and follow it to an end requires some of
the same courage that a soldier needs. Peace has its victories, but it
takes brave men and women to win them: Ralph Waldo Emerson

Some things you must always be unable to bear. Some things you must
never stop refusing to bear. Injustice and outrage and dishonor and
shame. No matter how young you are or how old you have got. Not for
kudos and not for cash, your picture in the paper nor money in the bank,
neither. Just refuse to bear them: William Faulkner

Whenever you are in doubt or when the self becomes too much with you,
try the following experiment: Recall the face of the poorest and most
helpless person you have ever seen and ask yourself if the step you
contemplate is going to be for any use to him or to her . . . Then you
will find your doubts and your self melting away: Mohandas Gandhi

"When the natural weakness and imperfection of human understanding is
considered, with the unavoidable influences of education, custom, books
and company, upon our ways of thinking, I imagine a man must have a good
deal of vanity who believes, and a good deal of boldness who affirms,
that all the doctrines he holds, are true, and all he rejects are
false." -Benjamin Franklin 1740

When you give food to the poor, they call you a saint. When you ask why
the poor have no food, they call you a communist: Archbishop Helder
Camara, Brazilian liberation theologist 

Peace we want because there is another war to fight against poverty,
disease and ignorance: Indira Gandhi, 1966 

It is easier to lead men to combat, stirring up their passion, than to
restrain them and direct them toward the patient labors of peace: Andre
Gide 

No one has a right to sit down and feel hopeless. There is too much work
to do: Dorothy Day

The history of the race, and each individual's experience, are thick
with evidence that a truth is not hard to kill and that a lie told well
is immortal: Mark Twain

Freedom had been hunted round the globe; reason was considered as
rebellion; and the slavery of fear had made men afraid to think. But
such is the irresistible nature of truth, that all it asks, and all it
wants, is the liberty of appearing: Thomas Paine, Rights of Man, 1791 

I never will, by any word or act, bow to the shrine of intolerance or
admit a right of inquiry into the religious opinions of others.: -Thomas
Jefferson 

All sects are different, because they come from men; morality is
everywhere the same, because it comes from God.: -Voltaire 

There's so many things going on in the world, Babies dying. Mothers
crying. How much oil is one human life worth. And what ever happened to
peace on earth: Willie Nelson

I never will, by any word or act, bow to the shrine of intolerance or
admit a right of inquiry into the religious opinions of others.: -Thomas
Jefferson 

All sects are different, because they come from men; morality is
everywhere the same, because it comes from God.: -Voltaire 

There's so many things going on in the world, Babies dying. Mothers
crying. How much oil is one human life worth. And what ever happened to
peace on earth: Willie Nelson

"We are on the verge of global transformation. All we need is the right
major crisis and the nations will accept the New World Order."
statement by David Rockefeller to the United Nations Business Council in
1994:

 "...it may find it more difficult to fashion a consensus [in America]
on foreign policy issues, except in the circumstances of a truly massive
and widely perceived direct external threat." Zbigniew Brzezinski in his
book, The Grand Chessboard:.

"a terrorist, massive, casualty-producing event [will occur] somewhere
in the Western world - it may be in the United States of America - that
causes our population to question our own Constitution and to begin to
militarize our country in order to avoid a repeat of another mass,
casualty-producing event." General Tommy Franks calls for Repeal of US
Constitution, November 2003

"We could blow up a U.S. ship in Guantanamo Bay and blame Cuba," "We
could develop a Communist Cuban terror campaign in the Miami area, in
other Florida cities and even in Washington" "casualty lists in U.S.
newspapers would cause a helpful wave of national indignation." (See the
declassified Top Secret 1962 document titled "Justification for U.S.
Military Intervention in Cuba"16 (See Operation Northwoods)

"We could blow up a U.S. ship in Guantanamo Bay and blame Cuba," "We
could develop a Communist Cuban terror campaign in the Miami area, in
other Florida cities and even in Washington" "casualty lists in U.S.
newspapers would cause a helpful wave of national indignation." (See the
declassified Top Secret 1962 document titled "Justification for U.S.
Military Intervention in Cuba"16 (See Operation Northwoods at
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/NOR111A.html ).

"We could blow up a U.S. ship in Guantanamo Bay and blame Cuba," "We
could develop a Communist Cuban terror campaign in the Miami area, in
other Florida cities and even in Washington" "casualty lists in U.S.
newspapers would cause a helpful wave of national indignation." (See the
declassified Top Secret 1962 document titled "Justification for U.S.
Military Intervention in Cuba"16 (See Operation Northwoods at
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/NOR111A.html ).

" For those who have fought for it, freedom has a taste the protected
will never know."  Otto von Bismark 

"Reason is a narrow system swollen  into an ideology. With time and
power it has become a dogma, devoid of direction and disguised as
disinterested inquiry.  Like most religions, reason presents itself as
the solution to the problems it has created."  (John Ralston Saul in
"Voltaire's Bastards") 

"The envelope is only defined--and expanded--by the test pilot who dares
to push it."  (H.H. Craven Jr.(a gifted pilot)

"All things have inner meaning and form and power." (Hopi) *

"In this world the unseen has power."  (Apache) *

"Be satisfied with needs instead of wants." (Tenton Lakota) 

"The Great Spirit is always angry with men who shed innocent blood."
(Iowa) 

 "It is no longer good enough to cry  peace, we must act peace, live
peace, and live in peace."(Shenandoah) *

"A people without a history is like the wind over buffalo
grass."(Lakota) *

"There are many paths to a meaningful sense of the natural world."
(Blackfoot)

"A shady lane breeds mud." (Hopi)

 "Strive to be a person who is never absent from an important act."
(Osage)

"Men in search of a myth will usually find one."(Pueblo) * 

"Life is not separate from death. It only looks that way." (Blackfoot)

 "Some are smart but they are not wise."(Shoshone)

"The one who tells the stories rules the world." (Hopi)

"Force, no matter how concealed, begets resistance." (Lakota)

* "The only things that need the protection of men are the things of
men, not the things of the spirit." (Crow)

 "When the legends die, the dreams end; there is no more greatness."(
Shawnee )

"I love a people who do not live for the love of money."(Dwamish) 

 "Stolen food never satisfies hunger." (Omaha) 

"Man's law changes  with his understanding of man. Only the laws of the
spirit always remain the same." (Crow)

 "It takes a whole village to raise a child." (Omaha)

 "Everything the Power does, it does in a circle."(Lakota) 

"Man has responsibility, not power."(Tuscarora) 

"With all things and in all things, we are relatives." (Lakota) 

"The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the
point  however, is to change it."(Karl Marx)

"Evil is no faceless stranger living in a distant neighborhood.  Evil
has a wholesome, hometown face, with merry eyes and an open smile. Evil
walks among us, wearing a mask which looks like all our faces. (The Book
of Counted Sorrows) 

"There's a lot of people who still don't get it. They don't get it that
these guys are playing for keeps; that  they are going after you; that
they are not going to leave any little bit left for you...there's only
one thing the ruling circles throughout history have ever wanted and
that's everything."  (Michael Parenti, "Fascism: The False Revolution"
Speech 9/23/95) 

 

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