Political language -- and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists -- is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.
In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face - forever.
But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.
Sometimes the first duty of intelligent men is the restatement of the obvious.
Whatever is funny is subversive, every joke is ultimately a custard pie... a dirty joke is a sort of mental rebellion.
In our age there is no such thing as 'keeping out of politics.' All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred and schizophrenia.
All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome.
At fifty everyone has the face he deserves.
Most people get a fair amount of fun out of their lives, but on balance life is suffering, and only the very young or the very foolish imagine otherwise.
John Stuart Mill
Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are conservatives.
The amount of eccentricity in a society has generally been proportional to the amount of genius, mental vigor, and moral courage it contained. That so few now dare to be eccentric marks the chief danger of the time.
The general tendency of things throughout the world is to render mediocrity the ascendant power among mankind.
Whatever crushes individuality is despotism, by whatever name it may be called and whether it professes to be enforcing the will of God or the injunctions of men.
A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.
Mark Twain
Don't let schooling interfere with your education.
All generalizations are false, including this one.
A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read.
Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please.
Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.
The Public is merely a multiplied "me."
Only kings, presidents, editors, and people with tapeworms have the right to use the editorial "we."
Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.
Only one thing is impossible for God: To find any sense in any copyright law on the planet.
Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.
Winston Churchill
The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.
I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.
Don't talk to me about naval tradition. It's nothing but rum, sodomy and the lash.
Never hold discussions with the monkey when the organ grinder is in the room.
Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfils the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.
However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results.
In war as in life, it is often necessary when some cherished scheme has failed, to take up the best alternative open, and if so, it is folly not to work for it with all your might.
Otto Von Bismarck
When you want to fool the world, tell the truth.
I have seen three emperors in their nakedness, and the sight was not inspiring.
Never believe anything in politics until it has been officially denied.
Be polite; write diplomatically ;even in a declaration of war one observes the rules of politeness.
Voltaire
A witty saying proves nothing.
If God created us in his own image, we have more than reciprocated.
When he to whom one speaks does not understand, and he who speaks himself does not understand, that is metaphysics.
I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: "O Lord make my enemies ridiculous." And God granted it.
To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered.
Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd.
It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.
The best way to be boring is to leave nothing out.
Karl Marx
Philosophy stands in the same relation to the study of the actual world as masturbation to sexual love.
All I know is I'm not a Marxist.
The writer may very well serve a movement of history as its mouthpiece, but he cannot of course create it.
Thursday, December 02, 2004
The Ukrainization of America
By Anonymous
The Opposition In Permanent Tent Cities?
Watching the events in Ukraine (gets the award for worst choice of flag colors – sky blue and yellow?) I am on one hand heartened to see and hear that there has been a minimum of violence and confrontation over the Presidential vote outcome. Except for one brief flare-up at the parliament building earlier this week, reporters from around the world are explaining that the mood in the gatherings and small tent clusters is, in many cases, actually festive.
And it looks like there may be resolution in due course as the legal machinations start to ratchet up. Most Ukraine-watchers are now fairly convinced there will be some form of re-vote and that foreign observers will probably be called in to assure the election is fair and free of the intimidation and fraud the government’s opponents are claiming “stole” the original election.
Which reminds me that there was talk of having foreign observers here in America to oversee the fairness of our own recent national polling. And, also, that there is currently a rather pathetic attempt still trying to make an issue out of the Ohio results being advanced by Democratic Party functionaries masquerading as non-hacks and ersatz champions of “the truth” (cue important music) – most recently supported by the increasingly irrelevant Rev. Jesse Jackson.
Heck, guys, my candidate didn’t win any electoral votes, but I have already moved on to the Christmas season – I have tons of gifts to buy.
Which leads me to my other point…
I can well imagine post-election challenges from here on out in America for the foreseeable future. The composition of political life in America being so splintered, the tenor so mean-spirited, and neither side willing to admit they played as much a part in creating that mood as the other side did; I can easily see the creation of a new Office of The Deputy of the Election Challenge being created one way or another in the hierarchy of both major parties.
But if “tent cities” didn’t spring up over the 2000 election results – which seemed more open to legitimate challenge than any national election my old eyes can recall – they sure aren’t going to spring up now.
The Right would never go that route because it might hurt the value of their IRAs, and the Left would never go that route because they wouldn’t be able to fit it into their social schedules. Anyway movie-stars in tent cities and placards and calls for “Bread, Land, Peace” aren’t likely to spring up with all these holiday parties going on. Especially in the colder states. It might happen after the winter – at least until Spring Break is done. Then of course there’s summer. But once the weather turns again it’s either back to school for the paper chase or time to get serious about your career. Then Christmas again.
Next thing you know it’s 2008.
Yeah… the Office of The Deputy of the Election Challenge makes more sense.
"Netpolitik is a new style of diplomacy that seeks to exploit the powerful capabilities of the Internet to shape politics, culture, values, and personal identity. But unlike Realpolitik — which seeks to advance a nation’s political interests through amoral coercion — Netpolitik traffics in “softer” issues such as moral legitimacy, culturalidentity, societal values, and public perception." - The Rise of Netpolitik
PUN-DIT (n) : A learned man; a teacher; a source of opinion; a critic: a political pundit.
