Category: Quote of the Day

“If you draw your sword against ‘your’ prince you must be prepared to throw away the scabbard.” – Machiavelli

Reader “LG” sent us this: Fed’s rescue halted a derivatives Chernobyl. JWR’s comment: I think “delayed” would have been a more accurate word than “prevented”, for the headline    o o o KAF flagged this Reuters article: Cities grapple with surge in abandoned homes    o o o RBS found a piece that is probably already “old news” to most SurvivalBlog readers: Cell Phones–FBI Can Listen In, Even When Phone is Turned Off    o o o Bee plague worsening, anxious keepers say

“[Recognition of] Peak Oil will never catch on in any major way, at least no more than the folks in the Tower of Babel economy ever caught on to the big flaw in their economic model. We’ve got 50 years invested in suburban buildout economy, 150 years invested in industrial living, and 500 years invested in the age of expansion to come to understand just what this means for us, at least in the aggregate.” – Matt Savinar, Editor of Life After The Oil Crash (LATOC)

“Words may show a man’s wit, but actions his meanings.” – Benjamin Franklin

"Society in every state is a blessing, but government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one; for when we suffer or are exposed to the same miseries by a government, which we might expect in a country without government, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer." – Thomas Paine, "Common Sense", 1776

"Fear them not therefore; for there is nothing covered that shall not be revealed: and hid, that shall not be known. What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light: and what ye hear in the ear, that preach ye on the housetops" – Jesus, in Matthew 10:26, 27

“Men are expendable; women and children are not. A tribe or a nation can lose a high percentage of its men and still pick up the pieces and go on… as long as the women and children are saved. But if you fail to save the women and children, you’ve had it, you’re done, you’re through! You join Tyrannosaurus Rex, one more breed that bilged its final test.” – Robert A. Heinlein, “The Pragmatics of Patriotism” address at the U.S. Naval Academy, April 5, 1973, later published in the book “Expanded Universe” (1980)

"The militia is the natural defense of a free country against sudden foreign invasions, domestic insurrections, and domestic usurpation of power by rulers. The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of the republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally … enable the people to resist and triumph over them." – Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story, "Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States", Vol. 3, pp. 746-7, 1833

“The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the law of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If ‘Thou shalt not covet’ and ‘Thou shalt not steal’ were not commandments from Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society before it can be civilized or made free.” – John Adams, A Defence of the Constitution of the United States Against the Attacks of M. Turgot, 1787

“The first information survival skill we all need is the ability to decode propaganda and demythologize the highly commercialized and entertainment-based U.S. culture. Psychologists politely call it ‘resistance to enculturation.’ Writer Ernest Hemingway had a less elegant term: ‘cr*p detecting.’” – Karl Albrecht, article in Training and Development magazine, February 2001.

“The argument for liberty is not an argument against organization, which is one of the most powerful tools human reason can employ, but an argument against all exclusive, privileged, monopolistic organization, against the use of coercion to prevent others from doing better.” – Friedrich August von Hayek (1899-1992), Nobel Laureate of Economic Sciences 1974

"We are now experiencing the first truly major crisis of financial globalization. Never before have banks seen such destruction of their balance sheets in such a short time. Moreover, there are signs that the problems are spreading. The risk premiums on commercial property, consumer credit and corporate loans have risen sharply." – Swiss central bank governor Philipp Hildebrand, quoted March 12, 2008

“We’ve got a blind date with Destiny — and it looks like she’s ordered the lobster.” – William H. Macy, as “The Shoveler” in Mystery Men, 1999 (Screenplay by Neal Cuthbert.)

“I do not have a new message here; we have known for a long time that advance preparation and a strong balance sheet are the keys to riding out a financial storm. As I have emphasized before, the Federal Reserve can deal with liquidity pressures but cannot deal with solvency issues.” – William Poole, President of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, February 29, 2008 (as recently quoted by Dr. Gary North in his Reality Check e-newsletter.)

“I spoke to you in your prosperity, but you said, ‘I will not hear.’” – Jeremiah 22:21