Why do so many people chose to spend their whole life destroying paths they didn't even want to follow, instead of following the one path that would lead them somewhere.
The greater the crime perpetrated by the leadership, the less likely it is that the people will ever believe their leaders to be capable of perpetrating such an event.
Consul - in American politics, a person who having failed to secure an office from the people is given one by the Administration on condition that he leave the country.
There is no week, nor day, nor hour, when tyranny may not enter upon this country, if the people lose their supreme confidence in themselves, and lose their roughness and spirit of defiance. Tyranny may always enter—there is no charm or bar against it.
A theme that appears repeatedly in the writings of the social critics of the second half of the 20th century is the sense of purposelessness that afflicts many people in modern society.
I think soft power definitely can work. But, you know, it depends on who you're dealing with. Some people are so intent upon power and keeping power that it's very difficult to conduct soft power.
The only way that Hollywood ever skews toward liberal is because part of what we make out of Hollywood involves writers, actors, directors, musicians, set designers, and photographers. In general, people like that are going to be more progressive, more open minded, a little more altruistic.
It's not given to people to judge what's right or wrong. People have eternally been mistaken and will be mistaken, and in nothing more than in what they consider right and wrong.
I was pretty realistic to people about what we could get done, and the situation we were in, and trying to tamp down expectations. If you listen to my stump speeches, if you listen to what I said at Grant Park, I kept on saying, "Look, this is not just about me, this is not going to happen in one year, or one term, or even one presidency." And we tried to layer into everything we were saying a sense of hope, but also realism.
Without scheming to do wrong, or to make others unhappy, there may be error and there may be misery. Thoughtlessness, want of attention to other people's feelings, and want of resolution, will do the business.
Wild beasts and birds are by right not the property merely of the people today, but the property of the unborn generations, whose belongings we have no right to squander.