#politic

For four centuries now, the American people have resigned themselves to natural disasters and acts of God: floods, prairie fires, blizzards, tornados, hurricanes, dust bowls, epidemics, academics, lawyers, and politicians. ↗

— Markham Shaw Pyle

#american-history #politics #nature

I discovered that Human Nature was not, as I had always supposed, a fixed and unalterable entity, that wars are not caused by a natural urge in men to fight, that ownership of land and factories is not necessarily the natural reward of greater wisdom and energy. ↗

— Jessica Mitford

#men

Unless the relationship of law to Christianity is re-established, there is no future except destruction for Western culture. ↗

— R. J. Rushdooney

#law #politics #relationship

Just as no sane farmer would express disappointment because his cow did not lay eggs or hope that his cow might be induced to lay eggs, an intelligent observer should be expected to refrain from critical or hortatory discussion of the functional capacity of the United Nations that is uninformed by an accurate understanding of the realistic possibilities. We have no warrant for being hopeful, disillusioned, cynical, or fearful of the United Nations, unless the expectations that enter into our judgment bear some sensible relationship to the nature of the organization and the limitations set by the political context within which it operates. ↗

— Inis L. Claude

#political-science #united-nations #intelligence

The colonialist's existence is so closely aligned with that of the colonized that he will never be able to overcome the argument which states that misfortune is good for something. With all his power he must disown the colonized while their existence is indispensable to his own. Having chosen to maintain the colonial system, he must contribute more vigor to its defense than would have been needed to dissolve it completely. Having become aware of the unjust relationship which ties him to the colonized, he must continually attempt to absolve himself. He never forgets to make a public show of his own virtues, and will argue with vehemence to appear heroic and great. At the same time his privileges arise just as much from his glory as from degrading the colonized. ↗

— Albert Memmi

#colonialism #europeans #history #imperialism #politics

Governments were only invented to give banks a medium of exchange. Politicians are the only universal currency. ↗

— Bauvard

#currency #funny #government #humor #money

If you put your politicians up for sale, as the US does (alone in this among industrialized democracies), then someone will buy them--and it won’t be you; you can’t afford them. ↗

— Juan Cole

#money #politicians #politics #super-pacs #united-states

If politics left out the manipulation of money, I would perhaps view it more than a partisan traffic jam that never ends. ↗

— Zephyr McIntyre

#money

If you look at how the federal government spends our money, it’s an insurance conglomerate protected by a large, standing army. ↗

— Ezra Klein

#insurance #military #money #politics #money

I've always found the thousand dollar dinners more unsettling than the twenty-five-thousand dollar ones --- if someone pays the Republican National Committee twenty-five thousand dollars (or, more likely, fifty per couple) to breathe the same air as Charlie for an hour or two, then it's clear the person has money to spare. What breaks my heart is when it's apparent through their accent or attire that a person isn't well off but has scrimped to attend an event with us. We're not worth it! I want to say. You should have paid off your credit-card bill, invested in your grandchild's college fund, taken a vacation to the Ozarks. Instead, in a few weeks, they receive in the mail a photo with one or both of us, signed by an autopen, which they can frame so that we might grin out into their living room for years to come. ↗

— Curtis Sittenfeld

#elections #politician-s-wife #politics #money