Rational Nation USA Quotes Of The Week

Rational Nation US has been running quotes of the week for going on the eight week. Generally they have been well received. They were not designed to elicit comment. Nor were they intended to generate negative or positive political references.

Quotes of the week were merely intended as a fun diversion for me, and for my readers to use as they see fit. On a personal note I have always found quotes that have real value as stimulus for individual thought, and how each might relate to the present. Quotes from wise and knowledgeable people, either living or dead, offer value to the present and future.

There is apparently at least one individual who runs a Radical Perspective blog who has taken Rational Nation USA to task if you will for running quotes of our Founding Fathers and Ayn Rand. In essence his comments are specifically meant to bring into question my intelligence, but I suspect his intent is also to marginalize our nations history to some degree.

If the use of quotes to highlight, or add emphasis to issues or concepts is so out of place (as the Radical one seems to believe) why is it these quotes have remained available for us to read yet today. Why is it that Confucius, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, John F. Kennedy, FDR, ... as well as Rand and the founding fathers are quoted yet today.

I believe it is because wisdom and truth live forever. I also believe quotes from men and women with intellect and rational thought (living or dead) can be useful in focusing our own thoughts on matters of concern. There is realty little that is new, or hasn't been thought of before in the sphere of politics, government, ethics, and philosophy. The trick is to apply relevant available knowledge to changing circumstances in effective ways.

Rational Nation USA merely makes available quotes that seem reasonable and sometimes thought provoking. It is then up to the individual to use them, or not, as they see fit.

There will one day spring from the brain of science a machine or force so fearful in its potentialities, so absolutely terrifying, that even man, the fighter, who will dare torture and death in order to inflict torture and death, will be appalled, and so abandon war forever.  Thomas A. Edison 


A free America... means just this: individual freedom for all, rich or poor, or else this system of government we call democracy is only an expedient to enslave man to the machine and make him like it.  Frank Lloyd Wright 


Conservative, n: A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal who wishes to replace them with others.  Ambrose Bierce


Free speech is not to be regulated like diseased cattle and impure butter. The audience that hissed yesterday may applaud today, even for the same performance.  William O. Douglas


I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice! And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.  Barry Goldwater 


If we don't believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don't believe in it at all. 
 Noam Chomsky 


Life without liberty is like a body without spirit.  Kahlil Gibran


Bonus Quote of the week:


A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine.  Thomas Jefferson

Comments

  1. AnonymousMon Feb 22, 02:13:00 PM EST

    Oh, Rational...the person who runs Radical Perspective does not question your intelliegence...but rather questions the 'selectability' and application of said quotes.

    We all know how much conservatives love quotes....but do you hear any of them quote Washington or Jefferson in regards to how wars bankrupt countries, about the evils of standing armies, or about the fact that we should never into in alliances with other countries but trade with all?

    No, you don't because then that would mean that the conservatives within the Republican Party would have to give up on the support of Israel and bring the troops home and de militarize this country...

    By the way, when you mention my blog why not link to it, as I do to any blog I comment about!

    By the way, William O. Douglas is a favorite of mine!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Les CarpenterMon Feb 22, 03:06:00 PM EST

    TAO - With respect to conservatism. It is why I am and independent conservative.

    I do quote Jefferson. In fact I consider myself to be a Jeffersonian "conservative of 2010", and I recognize there is more I can learn.

    It is also why I support Ron Paul and his brand of conservative/libertarianism.

    I have linked you in the past. However, I find it senseless, as well as counter productive, to link to those who wish to trash me my principals, and the ideals that drove men of a more enlightened mindset to give us the greatest republic the world has ever witnessed.

    Simply put, those who wish to find a trash and burn artist will do so on their own. I, rather than giving them a link, showed them the path. They can simply find you on their own.

    Adults converse. Adolescents play games. I know which characterization fits me. Do you?

    Douglas had his good points. As do most rational Supreme Court Justices, albeit some more than others.

    As an afterthought... to say you don't question my intelligence but rather my selectability and application of said quotes is just a polite way of questioning my intelligence. I won't fall for it again.

    I leave it to the reader to apply the quote as they see fit.

    ReplyDelete

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