Oh man, gimme some humor please....

Yikes.......... a little levity! Levity over here....! Somebody....?!

Ah, thank goodness.

Here we go....


Backyard Blitzkrieg

BushHoax.gif (image)

Things we've been wondering about

Handy guide to the housing market

The comedic genius of Alan Greenspan

Republicans and Democrats: a brief parable

The quest for common ground

What will Democrats do? ~ This Modern World

Exploring the Mysteries of the Quantum Cheneyverse

Sorry, we're you saying something?

How the news works - once again

The Neocon Gameshow

Ok - this one's a tad dark:
Extraordinary rendition or free surprise vacation?

Um....this one too:
CIA Backed Saddam: Thanks for the Memories

Ya, and this one:
Bush is not a Nazi - So stop saying that!

Ah, one more:
Stephen Colbert: Enjoy the Police State

But not this one. This one is smiley: happy clown candy land!
Changes - Presidential Candidates feat. Bowie

Powder Keg USA: US heading toward fascism and civil war

“In the long run it is far more dangerous to adhere to illusion than to face what the actual truth is.” – David Bohm

It is very important that we now divest ourselves of any remaining willful ignorance. It is too late, and the stakes too high, for denial and wishful thinking to persist. Dream of better times, generate and hold fast to a more noble vision, but do not let our view of reality be skewed by a fear of facing the truth.

A year and a half ago I came across information pertaining to a number of very large issues, and was compelled to research them, and their inter-relationships, implications, and probable outcomes, and then to summarize as concisely as possible these research findings and analyses. What I concluded then, in October of 2006, was that a number of very large patterns were in motion which, as they unfold, will profoundly affect the US and the world, and further, that the United States was a powder keg, set to explode. Less than eighteen months later, we can see that the analysis was clearly correct, in all major facets, and the US is even more clearly, a powder keg waiting to explode. Here’s why, and here are some of the implications. The patterns are of profound significance and are unfolding rapidly, with increasing speed, therefore understanding them and forming appropriate responses is of urgent necessity.

From the October 2006 research summary:

A number of points which are now either undeniable, or at least have increasing and very strong evidence to support them:

1. The United States is in a deep and growing crisis of legitimacy, a serious and deepening internal political crisis, with the result of very significant and mounting instability – a crisis which will only get worse by ignoring it, and will be further exacerbated by the other related unfolding crises, both manufactured and otherwise. The following inter-related dynamics will affect the growing US political crisis profoundly.

2. The US is on the verge of economic collapse. 14 months later, this now is admitted by nearly everyone. When economic collapse hits the US, the political crisis will move from deeply serious to explosive as public discontent reaches a flashpoint. US elites are most certainly taking actions in advance to deal with the deepening political crisis.

3. Peak oil is about to hit globally, with profound economic, social and political implications for the US and the world. That was the best analysis in fall 2006. It now has hit, and is unfolding, as is being admitted. As predicted, oil prices rose dramatically, causing global economic shock and downturn. Oil prices went from US$ 50 a barrel in 2006 to US$ 100 a barrel in 2007. Between 2002 and 2007 world oil prices rose from US$ 20/barrel to US$ 100/barrel – a five-fold increase, again, as predicted. The economic ramifications are severe and growing as energy costs for all manufacturing and shipping rise exponentially.

In case you haven’t been watching:

World oil production is expected to decline sharply by 2030: report

EWG_Oilreport_Summary_10-2007.pdf (application/pdf Object)

4. A political scandal of simply tectonic magnitude is unfolding rapidly within the US – speaking from October 2006 - on top of the already precarious situation of a long-standing and slowly deepening political crisis. (Remember that the slowly deepening crisis of legitimacy which unfolded over decades within the Soviet Union led ultimately to a “tipping point” in which the entire structure collapsed, virtually overnight.) In September and October 2006 two things happened which moved the US domestic political crisis from deep and growing, to precipitous and potentially cataclysmic in terms of its effects, as least as far as the political and business elite of the country are concerned. One: Hugo Chavez stated before the UN that there is growing evidence, and a growing number of people around the world and within the US are coming to believe, that elements within the US government actively participated in the terrorist attacks on the US on September 11. The media around the world and across the US reported on a story that was too big to silence: the story of the accusation, that is. A much more important event occurred that fall: the number of US citizens who believe it is very likely or somewhat likely that elements within the US government were actively involved in the 9/11 terrorist attack on the US reached 36% - and the number of Americans who do not believe the official story reached a stunning 84%. As of October 2006 only 16% of Americans believed the official story. This is a cataclysmic scale crisis of legitimacy, a scandal of truly tectonic proportions. This is what I would call a “house of cards event.”

By now, fourteen months later, over 100 scholars, prominent military, intelligence, government and media figures have stated that the official story is untenable, and that there are serious questions as to active involvement in the attacks by high level US government officials and agents. The former head of the Russian air force has stated the official story is impossible (that statement actually came in fall 2001). Former German parliamentarian Helmut Schmidt has said that WTC-7 was brought down by controlled demolition, in order to conceal the evidence as to who orchestrated the attack, which was coordinated out of that same building. Former assistant editor for the Wall Street Journal, and creator of Reaganomics, Paul Craig Roberts, has said that the evidence is incontrovertible that WTC-7 was brought down by controlled demolition. Former Italian Prime Minister Francesco Cossiga has publicly declared that, “the disastrous attack was planned and carried out by the American CIA and the Mossad” – and went on to state that every intelligence agency in the world knows this.

The domestic political crisis in the US, though smoothed over by the network media, is fast approaching a tipping point, and the political and business elite are highly aware of this fact. When popular discontent is already deep and wide, and a scandal of such magnitude is erupting, even the conditions that set off the first American Revolution seem to pale in comparison. Such gross criminal activity on the part of domestic elites is bound to provoke a full scale crisis of confidence, to put it mildly.

This makes Watergate look like a love-in. This is the stuff of a Boston Tea Party. US elites are not taking this lightly, of course.

5. For geo-strategic reasons, primarily control over world energy resources, as well as for reasons of domestic instability and internal political crisis (I’ll explain why in a moment), the US is likely to attack Iran, if the people of the US and the world do not stop a government that is out of control. This is only becoming more and more evident.

6. An attack on Iran would require an enormous pretext, given that the American people do not want even to continue the war in Iraq, let alone expand it. Opposition to the war in Iraq has now grown to approximately 70%. Yet the US government seems intent on expanding the war in the Middle East, and attacking Iran, possibly with nuclear weapons. (Controlling the Middle East means controlling approximately 70% of world oil supplies. Controlling world oil supplies means dominating the global economy and the world, as PNAC and the Pentagon have openly stated is their aim. Peak oil only adds to their sense of urgency.)

(Note that none of the remaining US presidential candidates, with the exception of Ron Paul and Mike Gravel, are willing to stop the current trend toward escalating war in the Middle East, so counting on electoral change is patently foolish, unless somehow Ron Paul or Mike Gravel were to win. Obama and Hillary have both said with regard to Iran, “Everything is on the table” – nuclear first strike and all.)

Not only would an attack on Iran risk ecological and humanitarian disaster, as well as seriously risk a world war, but would require the greatest of pretexts to get the American people to go along with it. In the words of the neo-con think tank PNAC, it would seem to require a “cataclysmic event,” or as Zbig himself described it in his 1997 book on global geo-strategy, The Grand Chessboard, a “Pearl Harbor type event.”

This begs a very frightening question. Following my analysis in the fall of 2006, less than six months later, Zbigniew Brzezinski warned the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee that just such a false flag event, a terrorist attack on the US, “blamed on Iran….and a quote, unquote, defensive retaliation against Iran,” was a likely scenario. Congressman Ron Paul has also stated that he believes the danger of a Gulf of Tonkin event is great. (He is softening the blow for us. It would be, rather, much more severe than an offshore event which would be needed, in all likelihood, given the extremely strong public opposition to expanding or even continuing the war.)

Remember also that former NATO Supreme Allied Commander General Tommy Franks said in an interview a couple of years ago that if there is another terrorist attack on the US it would likely be the end of democracy – Congress would not likely be reconvened, he said.

Of course, the final destruction of what remains of democracy, freedom and civil rights in America, under a police state, would provoke civil war. Again, the elite surely know this very well. Civil war in turn gives further pretext and justification for crackdown on dissent. “Domestic terrorism” charges will be used to eliminate all political opposition and dissenting voices – most likely via media spin, while individuals and groups are quietly rounded up in mass arrests, without trial or due process of law.

Witness the Green Zone and giant high-security embassy in Bagdad: US forces are training in maintaining full dominance within a setting of permanent civil war. Iraq is the laboratory for what is to be applied at home. War justifies repression, repression ensures continuing war, and war and repression yield dominance and plunder. It is a simple yet effective strategy, at least in the short run. Permanent war means a permanent state of emergency, as well as great profits for the military-industrial complex. It would be a return to the walled cities of feudal times, backed by new mercenaries armies such as Blackwater. Outside the walls, chaos, violence, war and poverty reign. Inside the walls, it is a pampered police state for those who are sufficiently obedient. It is a very dark road that the US has set upon. It is a path into what one might most appropriately call feudal fascism, both at home and abroad.

Note also that this current trajectory ties in perfectly with the business elites’ agenda for a “new security environment” in “Fortress North America” within the framework of feudal fascist rule via the NACC and SPP. Canada and Mexico will thus also be drawn into this morass unless resistance and an alternative vision are quickly generated. US business elites want Canadian oil and Mexican labour, as well as continental “security.” The popular movement to resist this agenda of fascism under continental corporate rule must therefore be international. We are now clearly in this together.

In each of these cases, the evidence has only grown more compelling.

Put the pieces together.

a) Deep and growing crisis of legitimacy in the US.

b) Rapidly unfolding economic crisis in the US, which will only exacerbate the
underlying political crisis.

c) Peak oil crisis unfolding rapidly, compounding both the economic and political
crises.

d) A “house of cards event” emerging rapidly with the 9/11 scandal – a scandal big enough to bring down not just a government, but an entire socio-political order, a la the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989-90.

e) A war planned on Iran to secure geostrategically vital world energy reserves, requiring a giant pretext to get the American people to accept expansion of war in the Middle East, when what they want now is to end it.

f) The warnings of former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski that such an unfolding of events is “likely.”

g) Tommy Franks statement that another event would precipitate the foreclosure of democracy in America.

Conclusion:

Elements of the US political and business elite are sufficiently desperate, power hungry and reckless as to consider and plan for a series of events, which, if successful, would resolve the political crisis in the US - by dissolving democracy and invoking a police state - while securing control over the majority of the world’s remaining energy reserves in an era of diminishing oil supplies. For some, this must seem a wonderful win-win scenario. Of course, for the vast majority, this means living hell.

If unsuccessful, the consequences may be global thermonuclear annihilation of the entire Northern Hemisphere – but you have to take some risks, right?

There are other profound implications, such as global economic collapse, due to the strangulation of oil shipments and spiking oil prices within the context of an already volatile and unstable global economy, but the very real potential of nuclear disaster tops the list, followed closely by the nightmare scenario of the re-emergence of fascism in the Western world.

By the way, Russia and China are now economic and military allies with Iran, and both are nuclear powers with ICBMs. Word is, the mad fools in Washington, or those at the helm at least, are actively seeking a confrontation with two of the world’s military, economic and nuclear superpowers. The insanity is truly mind-boggling.

As we speak, five air craft carrier groups are stationed off Iran, the war propaganda continues, preparing the public mind for acquiescence, and the political crisis in the US sinks deeper, while the US economy slides steadily off a cliff, and the peak oil crunch continues to unfold.

Think about it. This is end game. The US elite know this. We should harbour no illusions.

Note that this entire analysis does not even mention one giant and now undeniable pattern which is also rapidly unfolding, by clearly conscious design, and that is the war on democracy and the assault on freedom and civil liberties, which has been on-going and escalating since September 11 in particular. (It began earlier, but 9/11 was the “catalyst” to greatly speed up the process.) Consider the above in light of this.

The “Global War on Terror” (GWOT) has been used, and it is increasingly self-evident that it has been very consciously used, for the purpose of creating a state of permanent global imperial warfare on the one hand, and in order to “win” the war on democracy on the other. “Winning” in this context means global dominance is consolidated for the transnational business elite who already dominate the governments of the G-8 and the Western world. “Winning” is thus slavery for humanity – at home and abroad – and the destruction of democracy and freedom.

Note also that the Washington Post published a leaked memo from the Pentagon which was addressed to high level military and government officials, and which stated that the Global War on Terror is to be completed, won, by October 2008. The memo made explicit that this was a performance-related objective, communicating in definite terms that pay would be affected if targets are not reached.

What do we conclude from that? Bush and Cheney said this would be a war without end. Iraq has bogged down into civil war and quagmire and drags on endlessly, while neocons and Democrats bicker and posture while agreeing to “stay the course” and keep the troops in occupation position. Now the Pentagon wants the war wrapped up, completed and won within the next nine months (before the 2008 election). What dark entity is the Pentagon planning to birth in that time frame? What does the Pentagon consider “completion” or “winning” of the “global war on terror” – particularly when any intelligent observer can see that it is not a war on terrorism, but a war of empire and a war on democracy? Are we to assume then that the Pentagon has set a firm target, and that global consolidation of the empire, particularly, secure control over the Mid-East oil reserves, is to be complete by October 2008? That the war on democracy is to be won by October 2008? I think that we must give some very sober-minded consideration to these statements, in light of recent developments. A tremendous amount is at stake here.

I believe it is time we speak the truth directly. This is a war on the people of the earth. It must stop. And it is the people of the earth who must stop it.

I would say it is time for the people of the United States, and the people of the world, to stand up, and say in no uncertain terms, that this has gone far enough, and to demand, a) an end to military adventurism and imperial designs, and b) a respect for human rights, civil liberties, constitutional democracy, freedom and the self-determination of peoples in all nations – and in action, and not simply rhetoric.

Stop the madness!

People of the United States, people of the world, speak now. The stakes are high. This is our future. This is our children’s future. Too much is at stake to leave the future of humanity in the hands of those who are drunk with power. It is time to take the power back.

The future is in our hands. If we continue to give our power to a small band of elites, the above scenario will most likely unfold in all its terrible fullness. It is up to us, as always, the people of the Earth. Choose wisely. The powerful rule only when and if we give them our power. Remove that power and they fall like a house of cards. The Soviet Empire’s collapse proved this. It is now time for the collapse of the Western empire, and the birth of true democracy. Stay alert. The story is not yet over. We can write the next chapter if we so choose. Allowing the power elite to write it for us would be disastrous. Pick up the pen. Reclaim your power. Let us write a better story for the future of humanity and the earth.

"This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs: when he first appears, he is a protector." - Plato

"If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy." - U.S. President James Madison

"Terrorism is the best political weapon for nothing drives people harder than a fear of sudden death". - Adolph Hitler

"Why of course the people don't want war ... But after all it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship ... Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country." - Hermann Goering, Nazi leader, speaking before the Nuremberg Trials.

"The easiest way to gain control of a population is to carry out acts of terror. [The public] will clamor for such laws if their personal security is threatened". - Josef Stalin

But it can’t happen here. Or can it?

Do we really believe that certain countries are immune from the plots of evil men?

Really now.

JTR,

February 1, 2008

“War can never stop terrorism because war is the ultimate form of terrorism.”
- John Deer

“Empires don’t bring democracy, they control people…..Predictably, anyone who threatens imperial power is treated as if they were, to put it mildly, a trouble-maker, or even a terrorist….No-one in power really wants democracy, because democracy would challenge their power structures.” - Tony Benn

Noam Chomsky on Hegemony or Survival: America’s Quest For Global Dominance

“The End of America”: Naomi Wolf Warns U.S. in Slow Descent into Fascism - Democracy Now!

Power to the People (In Suits )

Ex-Italian Prime Minister - '9/11 Carried Out By CIA and Mossad' // Current

911 Proof

9-11 Research: Insider Trading

911 - Aftermath : Unanswered Questions from 9/11 (1 of 3)

THE TRUTH & LIES OF 9/11

911 L.A. Symposium - Webster Griffin Tarpley on 911 Evidence

Eisenhower warns us of the military industrial complex.

The War On Terror Is A Fabrication - Michel Chossudovsky

America's "Long War" From the Truman Doctrine to the NeoConservatives - Chossudovsky

Noam Chomsky on U.S. policy towards Iran

Chomsky: Do the Democrats have a different answer on Iran?

Brzezinski warns of Pearl Harbor type event, a pretext for war on Iran

Ron Paul - Gulf of Tonkin

Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama & John Edwards Equal No Change

Noam Chomsky - The Political system in the USA

Changes - Presidential Candidates feat. Bowie

Vote for Change? Atrocity-Linked U.S. Officials Advising Democratic, GOP Presidential Frontrunners - Democracy Now!

YouTube - Dennis Kucinich War on Iraq

YouTube - Dennis Kucinich - On Iraq

Pirates, Emperors and the Masters of the Universe - Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky on human destiny

Big Ideas That Changed The World : Democracy-Tony Benn

Overview: Geopolitics 2006-2008

America: A Fork In the Road

Money, Banks and Democracy: The reality beneath the ideological fantasies and spin

"Power follows property."

The Golden Rule, as cynically applied by the financial elite: "He who holds the gold makes the rules."

Of course, if you can dispense with the need for gold, and still make the rules, that's even better.

I think the evidence is enormously strong that democratically elected governments need to have greater control over their national currencies, not less. The "independence" of a privately owned central bank means economic policies which benefit the private bank's shareholders, rather than the people of the nation.

There is simply overwhelming evidence to support this view. Without democratic control of national currency, via democratically elected bodies such as Congress, sovereignty becomes an impossibility. We need to be dealing with reality here, not ideology.

Central banks that are privately owned - that is, controlled by large corporations or small groups of financial elites - tend to damage national economies while benefiting the financial elite, and more critically, undermine all ability of democratic governments to hold real power on behalf of the people, giving power to the bankers and corporations, and removing effective power from parliament or Congress.

Allowing private empires, such as those who control the FED, to "manage" the nation's money is pretty much letting the wolves guard the hen house. Democratically elected governments have the right, the mandate and the power to print and control the nation’s currency.

To forgo this right and pass this power to highly concentrated financial dynasties, is both unwise and highly dangerous. Jefferson, Jackson and Lincoln knew this, and fought to prevent the handing over of control of the nation's currency to a private bank. They were far more prescient than most people or politicians today. Their advice on keeping the central bank public and democratically controlled should have been heeded. Having failed to heed their warnings, we must today correct our mistake. The issue of control over national currency is absolutely central. All talk of freedom or democracy is meaningless and hollow if this is not addressed.

William Lyon Mackenzie King

Once a nation parts with the control of its currency and credit, it matters not who makes the nations laws. Usury, once in control, will wreck any nation. Until the control of the issue of currency and credit is restored to government and recognized as its most sacred responsibility, all talk of the sovereignty of parliament and of democracy is idle and futile.

Thomas Jefferson

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their money, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them (around the banks), will deprive the people of their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.

“I am a most unhappy man. I have unwittingly ruined my country. A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men. We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated Governments in the civilized world - no longer a Government by free opinion, no longer a Government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a Government by the opinion and duress of a small group of dominant men.”
-President Woodrow Wilson

Lord Acton

The issue which has swept down the centuries and which will have to be fought sooner or later is the people versus the banks.

James Madison

History records that the money changers have used every form of abuse, intrigue, deceit, and violent means possible to maintain their control over governments by controlling the money and its issuance.

Mayer Amschel Rothschild

Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes the laws.

Napoleon Bonaparte

When a government is dependent upon bankers for money, they and not the leaders of the government control the situation, since the hand that gives is above the hand that takes. Money has no motherland; financiers are without patriotism and without decency; their sole object is gain.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the large centers has owned the government of the U.S. since the days of Andrew Jackson.

Lord Acton

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Marcus Tullius Cicero

A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murder is less to fear.

David Rockefeller writes on pages 404 and 405 of his memoirs:
"The anti-Rockefeller focus of these otherwise incompatible
political positions [across the political spectrum] owes
much to Populism. 'Populists' believe in conspiracies, and
one of the most enduring is that a secret group of
international bankers and capitalists, and their minions,
control the world's economy. Because of my name and
prominence as the head of the Chase for many years, I have
earned the distinction of 'conspirator in chief' from some
of these people…Some even believe we are part of a secret
cabal working against the best interests of the United States,
characterizing my family and me as 'internationalists' and of
conspiring with others around the world to build a more
integrated global political and economic structure - one
world, if you will. If that is the charge, I stand guilty,
and I am proud of it."

Samuel Adams

If men, through fear, fraud, or mistake, should in terms renounce or give up any natural right, the eternal law of reason and the grand end of society would absolutely vacate such renunciation. The right to freedom being the gift of Almighty God, it is not in the power of man to alienate this gift and voluntarily become a slave.

Charles A. Lindbergh

This Act (the Federal Reserve Act, Dec. 23rd 1913) establishes the most gigantic trust on earth. When the President (Woodrow Wilson) signs the Bill, the invisible government of the Monetary Power will be legalised... The worst legislative crime of the ages is perpetrated by this banking and currency Bill.

H. L. Birum, Sr.

The Federal Reserve Bank is nothing but a banking fraud and an unlawful crime against civilization. Why? Because they "create" the money made out of nothing, and our Uncle Sap Government issues their "Federal Reserve Notes" and stamps our Government approval with NO obligation whatever from these Federal Reserve Banks, Individual Banks or National Banks, etc.

Grace Commission

100% of what is collected is absorbed solely by interest on the Federal Debt ... all individual income tax revenues are gone before one nickel is spent on the services taxpayers expect from government.

Henry Ford

It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning.

Robert A. Heinlein

Secrecy is the beginning of tyranny.

Lord Acton

Everything secret degenerates, even the administration of justice; nothing is safe that does not show how it can bear discussion and publicity.

Thomas Jefferson

If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.

Samuel Adams

How strangely will the Tools of a Tyrant pervert the plain Meaning of Words!

Thomas Jefferson

Yes, we did produce a near-perfect republic. But will they keep it? Or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom? Material abundance without character is the path of destruction.

Buddha

Believe nothing merely because you have been told it. Do not believe what your teacher tells you merely out of respect for the teacher. But whatsoever, after due examination and analysis, you find to be kind, conducive to the good, the benefit, the welfare of all beings -- that doctrine believe and cling to, and take it as your guide.

John Adams

Be not intimidated... nor suffer yourselves to be wheedled out of your liberties by any pretense of politeness, delicacy, or decency. These, as they are often used, are but three different names for hypocrisy, chicanery and cowardice.

Samuel Adams

The liberties of our country, the freedom of our civil Constitution, are worth defending at all hazards; and it is our duty to defend them against all attacks. We have received them as a fair inheritance from our worthy ancestors: they purchased them for us with toil and danger and expense of treasure and blood, and transmitted them to us with care and diligence. It will bring an everlasting mark of infamy on the present generation, enlightened as it is, if we should suffer them to be wrested from us by violence without a struggle, or to be cheated out of them by the artifices of false and designing men.

"The ultimate authority ... resides in the people alone." - James Madison

"It is more honorable to repair a wrong than to persist in it." - Thomas Jefferson

John F. Hylan

The real menace of our Republic is the invisible government which like a giant octopus sprawls its slimy legs over our cities states and nation. At the head is a small group of banking houses generally referred to as 'international bankers.' This little coterie... run our government for their own selfish ends. It operates under cover of a self-created screen...[and] seizes...our executive officers... legislative bodies... schools... courts... newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.

Justice Felix Frankfurter

The real rulers in Washington are invisible and exercise power from behind the scenes.

Charles-Louis De Secondat

There is no crueler tyranny than that which is perpetrated under the shield of law and in the name of justice.

Major L. L. B. Angus

The modern Banking system manufactures money out of nothing. The process is perhaps the most astounding piece of sleight of hand that was ever invented. Banks can in fact inflate, mint and unmint the modern ledger-entry currency.

"Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men's views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the Field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere -- so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive -- that they better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it." - Woodrow Wilson

Carroll Quigley

The powers of financial capitalism had (a) far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent meetings and conferences. The apex of the systems was to be the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the world's central banks which were themselves private corporations. Each central bank...sought to dominate its government by its ability to control Treasury loans, to manipulate foreign exchanges, to influence the level of economic activity in the country, and to influence cooperative politicians by subsequent economic rewards in the business world.

“They must find it difficult…those who have taken authority as the truth, rather than truth as the authority.” – Gerald Massey

“Where is the knowledge that is lost in information?

Where is the wisdom that is lost in knowledge?”

- T.S. Elliot

“Put fear behind and save the country.” – Simon Bolivar

“The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.”

- Eleanor Roosevelt.

“I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending
too much liberty than to those attending too small
a degree of it.” – Thomas Jefferson

"If there is anything which it is the duty of the whole people to never entrust to any hands but their own -- that thing is the preservation of their own liberties and institutions." – Abraham Lincoln

"The people of the United States are the rightful masters of both Congress and the Courts, not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution." - Abraham Lincoln

A diffusion of knowledge is the only guardian of true liberty. - James Madison

"I have the Confederacy before me, and the bankers behind me, and for my country I fear the bankers most." - Abraham Lincoln.

Enlighten the people, generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like spirits at the dawn of day. – Thomas Jefferson

Money, Banks and Democracy

For a tutorial on the nature of money and banking, see the excellent film: Money As Debt. You can find it on Google Video.

Money As Debt

For a critical look at Friedmanite economics, see Naomi Klein's Shock Doctrine. (2007 book, film, interviews on Democracy Now!)

The Shock Doctrine: Naomi Klein on the Rise of Disaster Capitalism - Democracy Now!

Other sources:

John Perkins on "The Secret History of the American Empire: Economic Hit Men, Jackals, and the Truth about Global Corruption" - Democracy Now!

Self-Described Economic Hit Man John Perkins: "We Have Created the World's First Truly Global Empire" - Democracy Now!

Free Market Fantasies, by Noam Chomsky 1/5

Monopoly Men (Federal Reserve Fraud)

Ron Paul on Federal Reserve, banking and economy

Ron Paul Challenges the Federal Reserve

Ron Paul of Texas - The End of Dollar Hegemony

Noam Chomsky - Emerging Framework of World Power

The Secret History of the CIA - John Stockwell

Former CIA agent Philip Agee on Permanent War

The Corporation

Life and Debt - Globalization and Jamaica

Noam Chomsky - Class War (Part 1)

America : Freedom to Fascism - Director's Authorized Version

The Power of Nightmares: BBC Dissects War on Terror - Part 1: Baby it's Cold Outside

*****“The End of America”: Naomi Wolf Warns U.S. in Slow Descent into Fascism - Democracy Now! |

“Liberal Democracy is moving toward a form of corporate dictatorship" - John Pilger on Propaganda, the Press, Censorship and Resisting the American Empire

Big Ideas That Changed The World : Democracy-Tony Benn

Favourite Quotes

I.

While civilization has been improving our houses, it has not equally improved the men who are to inhabit them. It has created palaces, but it was not so easy to create noblemen and kings. - Thoreau, Walden

If necessary, let us forgo one bridge across the river, go `round a little there, and throw at least one span across the greater gulf of ignorance that surrounds us.

- Thoreau, Walden

"Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.”

- Walden, Henry David Thoreau

There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root.

- Thoreau, Walden

Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it. - The Buddha

Unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth. ~Albert Einstein

There is more to heaven and earth than is contained in your philosophy.

- Shakespeare

It is better to follow one’s own dharma, no matter how imperfectly, than to follow that of another. - The Upanishads

(Dharma in this context means one’s true nature, one’s true path.)

Why should we be in such desperate haste to succeed and in such desperate enterprises? If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away. – Henry David Thoreau, Walden

I sometimes despair of getting anything accomplished with the help of my fellow man; you would have to put their minds through a kind of powerful vice first, to squeeze their olds ideas out of them. - Thoreau, Walden

Age is no better, hardly so well, qualified for an instructor as youth, for it has not profited so much as it has lost. One may almost doubt if the wisest man has learned anything of absolute value by living. - Thoreau, Walden

When I reflect upon the ruts in a road, I am forced to think, how much deeper the ruts of the mind. - Thoreau, Walden

It is never too late to give up your prejudices. - Thoreau, Walden

I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavor. - Thoreau, Walden

Life is rounded by a little sleep.

- Shakespeare

Only that day dawns to which we are awake. - Thoreau, Walden

I do not wish, when I come to the end of this life, to find I had not lived.

- Thoreau, Walden

We select granite for the underpinning of our houses and barns; we build fences of stone; but we do not ourselves rest on an underpinning of granitic truth, the lowest primitive rock. Our sills are rotten. - Thoreau

The greater part of what my neighbors call good I believe in my soul to be bad, and if I repent of anything it is very likely to my good behavior. What demon possessed me that I behaved so well? - Thoreau, Walden

In accumulating property for ourselves or our posterity, in founding a family or a state, or acquiring fame even, we are mortal; but in dealing with truth we are immortal, and need fear no change or accident. - Thoreau

That so many are ready to live by luck, and so get the means of commanding the labor of others less lucky, without contributing any value to society! And that is called enterprise! I know of no more startling development of the immorality of trade, and all the common modes of getting a living. The philosophy and poetry and religion of such a mankind are not worth the dust of a puffball. The hog that gets his living by rooting, stirring up the soil so, would be ashamed of such company. If I could command the wealth of all the worlds by lifting my finger, I would not pay such a price for it. - Thoreau

We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us in our soundest sleep. - Thoreau, Walden

Silence is the communing of a conscious soul with itself. If the soul attend for a moment to its own infinity, then and there is silence. She is audible to all men, at all times, in all places, and if we will we may always hearken to her admonitions. - Thoreau

The only Zen you find on the mountain top is the Zen you bring with you.

- unknown

I took my stand in the midst of humanity, and I wept for them, for they came into the world blind, and they seek to leave the world blind.

- Jesus, Gospel of Thomas

See what is before your nose and all will be revealed.

- Jesus, Gospel of Thomas

The kingdom of heaven is within you.

- Jesus, Gospel of Thomas

The kingdom of heaven is spread out upon the earth, and men see it not.

- Jesus, Gospel of Thomas

The priests are like dogs that lay in the manger, for they do not eat, and they do not let the cattle eat. - Jesus, Gospel of Thomas

I have never met a man who was fully awake; if I did, how could I look him in the eye? - Thoreau, Walden

II.

They are busy, as an old book says, laying up treasures that moths and rust will corrode, and thieves break through and steal. It is a fool’s life, as they will find out at the end of it, if not sooner. - Thoreau, Walden

Our lives are frittered away by detail. Simplify, simplify!

- Thoreau, Walden

Superfluous wealth can buy superfluities only. Money is not required to buy one necessary of the soul. - Thoreau

Most men are engaged in business the greater part of their lives, because the soul abhors a vacuum, and they have not discovered any continuous employment for man's nobler faculties. - Thoreau

How trivial and uninteresting and wearisome and unsatisfactory are all employments for which men will pay you money! - Thoreau

... I do not need the police of meaningless labor to regulate me.... - Thoreau, Life Without Principle (LWP)

Most men would feel insulted if it were proposed to employ them in throwing stones over a wall, and then in throwing them back, merely that they might earn their wages. But many are no more worthily employed now. - Thoreau (LWP)

The ways by which you may get money almost without exception lead downward. To have done anything by which you earned money merely is to have been truly idle or worse. If the laborer gets no more than the wages which his employer pays him, he is cheated, he cheats himself. If you would get money as a writer or lecturer, you must be popular, which is to go down perpendicularly. Those services which the community will most readily pay for, it is most disagreeable to render. You are paid for being something less than a man. - Thoreau (LWP)

The community has no bribe that will tempt a wise man. You may raise money enough to tunnel a mountain, but you cannot raise money enough to hire a man who is minding his own business. An efficient and valuable man does what he can, whether the community pay him for it or not. - Thoreau (LWP)

If I should sell both my forenoons and afternoons to society, as most appear to do, I am sure that for me there would be nothing left worth living for. I trust that I shall never thus sell my birthright for a mess of pottage. I wish to suggest that a man may be very industrious, and yet not spend his time well. There is no more fatal blunderer than he who consumes the greater part of his life getting his living. All great enterprises are self-supporting. The poet, for instance, must sustain his body by his poetry, as a steam planing-mill feeds its boilers with the shavings it makes. You must get your living by loving. - Thoreau (LWP)

It is remarkable that there is little or nothing to be remembered written on the subject of getting a living; how to make getting a living not merely holiest and honorable, but altogether inviting and glorious; for if getting a living is not so, then living is not. One would think, from looking at literature, that this question had never disturbed a solitary individual's musings. Is it that men are too much disgusted with their experience to speak of it? The lesson of value which money teaches, which the Author of the Universe has taken so much pains to teach us, we are inclined to skip altogether. As for the means of living, it is wonderful how indifferent men of all classes are about it, even reformers, so called- whether they inherit, or earn, or steal it. I think that Society has done nothing for us in this respect, or at least has undone what she has done. Cold and hunger seem more friendly to my nature than those methods which men have adopted and advise to ward them off. - Thoreau (LWP)

If a man has spent all his days about some business, by which he has merely got to be rich, as it is called, i.e., has got much money, many houses and barns and woodlots, then his life has been a failure, I think; but if he has been trying to better his condition in a higher sense than this, has been trying to invent something, to be somebody, - i.e., to invent and get a patent for himself - so that all may see his originality, though he should never get above board - and great inventors, you know, commonly die poor - I shall think him comparatively successful. - Thoreau

A stereotyped but unconscious despair is concealed even under what are called the games and amusements of mankind. - Thoreau, Walden

(TV is perhaps the most ugly, pathetic and vacuous example, next to heroine. - JTR)

As if you could kill time without injuring eternity. - Thoreau, Walden

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation. But it is uncharacteristic of wisdom to do desperate things. - Thoreau, Walden

It's not enough to be busy. The question is: What are we busy about?

- Thoreau, Walden

If a man walks in the woods for love of them half of each day, he is in danger of being regarded as a loafer. But if he spends his days as a speculator, shearing off those woods and making the earth bald before her time, he is deemed an industrious and enterprising citizen. - Thoreau, Walden

Most of the luxuries and many of the so-called comforts of life are not only not indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind.

- Thoreau, Walden

No way of thinking or doing, however ancient, can be trusted without proof. What everybody echoes or in silence passes by as true today may turn out to be falsehood tomorrow, mere smoke of opinion, which some had trusted for a cloud that would sprinkle fertilizing rain on their fields. - Thoreau, Walden

Public opinion is a weak tyrant, compared with our private opinion--what a man thinks of himself, that is which determines, or rather indicates his fate. - Thoreau, Walden

The finest qualities of our nature, like the bloom on fruits, can be preserved only by the most delicate handling. Yet we do not treat ourselves nor one another thus tenderly. - Thoreau, Walden

If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them. - Thoreau, Walden

Ultimately, men hit only what they aim for; therefore, though they should fail immediately, they had better aim high. - Thoreau, Walden

III.

I became convinced that noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation with good. - Martin Luther King Jr.

I have to believe the American people are the most systematically lied to people on earth – if I didn’t, I would believe they were the most evil.
- Former foreign minister for Nicaragua

Any dictator would admire the uniformity and obedience of the media.

Noam Chomsky

I think we can be reasonably confident that if the American population had the slightest idea of what is being done in their name, they would be utterly appalled.

Noam Chomsky

(The same could be said for the people of any of the “leading” industrial nations.)

I HEARTILY ACCEPT the motto, — "That government is best which governs least"; and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which also I believe, — "That government is best which governs not at all"; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have…..But, to speak practically and as a citizen, unlike those who call themselves no-government men, I ask for, not at once no government, but at once a better government. Let every man make known what kind of government would command his respect, and that will be one step toward obtaining it.

- Thoreau, On Civil Disobedience

Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a conscience, then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward. It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right. The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right. - Thoreau, "Civil Disobedience"

Law never made men a whit more just; and, by means of their respect for it, even the well-disposed are daily made the agents of injustice. A common and natural result of an undue respect for law is, that you may see a file of soldiers, colonel, captain, corporal, privates, powder-monkeys, and all, marching in admirable order over hill and dale to the wars, against their wills, ay, against their common sense and consciences, which makes it very steep marching indeed, and produces a palpitation of the heart. They have no doubt that it is a damnable business in which they are concerned; they are all peaceably inclined. Now, what are they? Men at all? or small movable forts and magazines, at the service of some unscrupulous man in power? - Thoreau, "Civil Disobedience"

The mass of men serve the state thus, not as men mainly, but as machines, with their bodies. They are the standing army, and the militia, jailers, constables, posse comitatus, etc. In most cases there is no free exercise whatever of the judgment or of the moral sense; but they put themselves on a level with wood and earth and stones; and wooden men can perhaps be manufactured that will serve the purpose as well. Such command no more respect than men of straw or a lump of dirt. They have the same sort of worth only as horses and dogs. Yet such as these even are commonly esteemed good citizens. Others, as most legislators, politicians, lawyers, ministers, and office-holders, serve the state chiefly with their heads; and, as they rarely make any moral distinctions, they are as likely to serve the devil, without intending it, as God. A very few, as heroes, patriots, martyrs, reformers in the great sense, and men, serve the state with their consciences also, and so necessarily resist it for the most part; and they are commonly treated as enemies by it. - Thoreau, "Civil Disobedience"

IV.

All machines have their friction; and possibly this does enough good to counterbalance the evil. At any rate, it is a great evil to make a stir about it. But when the friction comes to have its machine, and oppression and robbery are organized, I say, let us not have such a machine any longer. - Thoreau, "Civil Disobedience"

The illegal we do immediately. The unconstitutional takes a little longer. - Henry A. Kissinger

Corrupt politicians make the other ten percent look bad. - Henry A. Kissinger (One of the 90%.)

“Quite generally, international affairs have more than a slight resemblance to the Mafia. The Godfather does not take it lightly when he is crossed, even by a small storekeeper.” - Noam Chomsky

“The Constitution is just a piece of paper” - G.W. Bush

“It is impossible to understand the current U.S. policy if the real scope of September 11 is underestimated. The attacks perpetrated at that moment were a coup d’état. The war on terror is based on a myth and has become a compulsory state religion since such developments took place. The only way to fight against neoconservatives is by destroying this myth.” - U.S. journalist Webster Tarpley

In many regions of the world, democracy, freedom and human rights are seen as cynical slogans, Orwellian double-speak, mouthed by those who want oil and other natural resources, and the strategic pathways, such as Afghanistan, that lead to these resources.

- James Laxer

The so-called war on terror is really a struggle in which the United States and its allies are attempting to impose their hegemony on a large part of the world.

- James Laxer

I am convinced that those societies (as the Indians) which live without government, enjoy in their general mass an infinitely greater degree of happiness than those who live under the European governments. Among the former, public opinion is in the place of law, and restrains morals as powerfully as laws did anywhere. Among the latter, under pretense of governing, they have divided their nations into two classes, wolves and sheep. I do not exaggerate…Experience declares that man is the only animal which devours his own kind; for I can apply no milder term to the governments of Europe, and to the general prey of the rich on the poor. – Thomas Jefferson, 1787

What a stupendous, what an incomprehensible machine is man! Who can endure toil, famine, stripes, imprisonment and death itself in vindication of his own liberty, and the next moment, inflict on his fellow men a bondage, one hour of which is fraught with more misery than ages of that which he rose in rebellion to oppose. – Thomas Jefferson

I sincerely believe that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies. – Thomas Jefferson

This country is headed toward a single and splendid government of an aristocracy founded on banking institution and monied incorporations and if this tendency continues it will be the end of freedom and democracy. - Thomas Jefferson, 1816

The bank mania…is raising up a monied aristocracy in our country which has already set the government at defiance, and although forced at length to yield a little on this first essay of their strength, their principles are unyielded and unyielding. These have taken deep roots in the heart of that class from which our legislators are drawn, and the sop to Cerebus from fable has become history. - Thomas Jefferson, 1817

Once a nation parts with control of its currency and credit…all talk of the sovereignty of Parliament and democracy is idle and futile. – Mackenzie King, 1935

I hope we shall…crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country. - Thomas Jefferson, 1816

“Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism

because it is a merger of state and corporate power.”

- Benito Mussolini

“Private enterprise cannot be maintained in the age of democracy; it is only conceivable if the people have a sound idea of authority.”

- Adolph Hitler, speaking to a key meeting of Germany’s business elite, 1933.

The next election will be “the last one for the next 10 years, probably even for the next 100 years.” - Goering, following up on Hitler’s statement above, at the same meeting.

“We’re Philip Morris. We’ve got more money than God.”

– Guy Smith, Philip Morris executive.

The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than the democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is fascism: ownership of a government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. - Franklin Delano Roosevelt

“Society must take every means at its disposal to defend itself against the emergence of a parallel power which defies the elected power.” – Pierre Elliot Trudeau

Capital as such is not evil; it is its wrong use that is evil. Capital in some form or other will always be needed.
- Mohandas Gandhi

Socialists think profits are a vice; I consider losses the real vice.

- Winston Churchill

If you take all these bills together, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see that what we have here is a road map for, essentially, I am not exaggerating, a military junta, really in the hands of four cabinet ministers who can delegate right down to the ground. That what’s happening. If you look at, and there’s no argument against this if you look at the legislation, it is so offensive…The last point I want to make about this globalization and the militarization of that agenda is that if you look at the definition of terrorism, what they have done is very reptilian, very slippery…how broad the net has been cast.

- Canadian constitutional lawyer Rocco Galati on the post-9/11 “anti-terrorism” laws

The tragedy of modern war is that the young men die fighting each other--instead of their real enemies back home in the capitals. – Edward Abbey

“It should not be denied any longer: America is hurtling along the road to full-fledged fascism. To recognize this is the necessary first step in deflecting the juggernaut and creating the possibility of more peaceful tomorrows. It is legitimate and also necessary to correctly employ the power of naming.” - Barry Zwicker

If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. ~ James Madison

We have about 50% of the world's wealth but only 6.3% of its population. This disparity is particularly great as between ourselves and the peoples of Asia. In this situation, we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national security. To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and day-dreaming; and our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. We need not deceive ourselves that we can afford today the luxury of altruism and world-benefaction. (…)

In the face of this situation we would be better off to dispense now with a number of the concepts which have underlined our thinking with regard to the Far East. We should dispense with the aspiration to "be liked" or to be regarded as the repository of a high-minded international altruism. We should stop putting ourselves in the position of being our brothers' keeper and refrain from offering moral and ideological advice. We should cease to talk about vague and—for the Far East—unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better.

- Preeminent post-war long-term strategic planner for the U.S. National Security Council, George F. Kennan, from the formerly top-secret, now de-classified 1948 State Department Brief: NSC 68

“The U.S. has routinely destroyed democracy throughout the globe while its leaders spout words about spreading democracy.

“I spent thirty-three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country’s most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism....

“I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested.

“During those years, I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell racket. Looking back on it, I feel that I could have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.”

– Major-General Smedley Butler, 1933.

If there is one principle more deeply rooted in the mind of every American, it is that we should have nothing to do with conquest. - Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) 3rd American President

V.

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.

- Martin Luther King Jr.

The future holds ominous portent, and signs of great hope. Which result ensues depends largely upon what we make of the opportunities.

- Noam Chomsky

It aint’ over `till it’s over.

- Yogi Beara

The era of procrastination, of half-measures, of soothing and baffling expedients, of delays, is coming to a close. In its place we are entering a period of consequences… - Winston Churchill, on facing the threat of fascism (the first time)

We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time. Life often leaves us standing bare, naked and dejected with a lost opportunity. The "tide in the affairs of men" does not remain at the flood; it ebbs. We may cry out desperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is deaf to every plea and rushes on. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residue of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words: "Too late." There is an invisible book of life that faithfully records our vigilance of our neglect. "The moving finger write, and having writ moves on ..."
We still have a choice today: nonviolent coexistence or violent co-annihilation.

-- Martin Luther King, Jr, April 4, 1967

The coward will ask is it safe?...Vanity, is it politically expedient or popular? But conscience will always ask, is it right?

- Mahdi Bray

Those who would trade a little liberty for a little security, deserve neither. - Benjamin Franklin

Hope is not for wimps; it is for the strong-hearted who can recognize how bad things are and yet not be deterred, not be paralyzed. – Frances Moore Lappe

“Just because you bury your head in the sand doesn’t mean the headache will go away.”

- Italian saying

If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be. - Thomas Jefferson

“Liberty demands responsibility. That is why most men dread it.” - GBS

There is more day yet to dawn. The sun is but a morning star.

- Henry David Thoreau, Walden

If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution.

- Emma Goldman

Despite everything, I still believe people are basically good at heart.

- Anne Frank

The unity of the race of man, not only in its biology but also in its spiritual history…has everywhere unfolded in the manner of a single symphony, with its themes announced, developed, amplified and turned about, distorted, reasserted, and today, in a grand fortissimo of all sections sounding together, irresistibly advancing to some kind of mighty climax, out of which the next great movement will emerge.

- Joseph Campbell

Another world is not only possible, she is on her way.
On a quiet day I can hear her breathing.

– Indian writer Arundhati Roy,
World Social Forum, 2003

Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it.
Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.

- Geothe