Thursday, December 31, 2015

Anything IV

"People get used to anything. The less you think about your oppression, the more your tolerance for it grows. After a while, people just think oppression is the normal state of things. But to become free, you have to be acutely aware of being a slave."
--Assata Shakur

Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Tree

"Liberty is the feeling one gets, sitting under a tree in the wilderness"
--Silas Downer
(1766)

Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Inertia

"Spiritual movements are revolts of thought against inertia, of the few against the many; of those who because they are strong in spirit are strongest alone against those who can express themselves only in the mass and the mob, and who are significant only because they are numerous."
--Ludwig von Mises
(1881-1973) Economist and social philosopher
Source: Socialism. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund. 1981. p53

Monday, December 28, 2015

Resistance

"Liberty has never come from the government. Liberty has always come from the subjects of government. The history of liberty is the history of resistance. The history of liberty is a history of the limitation of governmental power, not the increase of it."
--Woodrow Wilson
(1856-1924) 28th US President
Speech, 1912

Sunday, December 27, 2015

Consolidation

"The consolidation of the states into one vast empire, sure to be aggressive abroad and despotic at home, will be the certain precursor of ruin which has overwhelmed all that preceded it."
--Robert E Lee

Saturday, December 26, 2015

Envelopes

[When Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., tells his wife he's going out to buy an envelope] "Oh, she says, well, you're not a poor man. You know, why don't you go online and buy a hundred envelopes and put them in the closet? And so I pretend not to hear her. And go out to get an envelope because I'm going to have a hell of a good time in the process of buying one envelope. I meet a lot of people. And, see some great looking babes. And a fire engine goes by. And I give them the thumbs up. And, and ask a woman what kind of dog that is. And, and I don't know. The moral of the story is, is we're here on Earth to fart around. And, of course, the computers will do us out of that. And, what the computer people don't realize, or they don't care, is we're dancing animals. You know, we love to move around. And, we're not supposed to dance at all anymore."
--Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
Interview by David Brancaccio, NOW (PBS) (October 7, 2005)

Friday, December 25, 2015

Miracles III

But Christmas miracles only happen in the lies adults tell to children.

And maybe in Christmas specials.

Mr.Uberwitz put on the play as scheduled.

Not a single word was changed.

And so, by some miracle, the world saw my vision that night.

The Adventures of Black Jesus received a 20-minute standing ovation.

It was called "a stunning revolution in theatre" by the Woodcrest Post Gazette.

Unfortunately, the PTA protest had gained some ground.

Seems that people didn't care about my vision.

They cared about seeing their kids on stage.

Who knew

Mr.Uberwitz was fired for disobeying orders and for generally being an irresponsible white person.

He would later become a professor of African American Studies at the University of Maryland.

No video exists of the one-time-only performance of The Adventures of Black Jesus.

Just as well.

I hate looking at my old work.


--The Boondocks: "A Huey Freeman Christmas"

Thursday, December 24, 2015

Presents

Jazmine: I think you should do a play about what Christmas is really about. Christmas is about how Santa died for our gifts and rose from the dead and moved to the North Pole and because of that, every year Santa comes down to forgive us our sins and give us eternal presents.

--The Boondocks: "A Huey Freeman Christmas"

Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Meeting

Jazmine: Oh, Huey! You’ve got a lunch meeting at 11:30 about the sound effects for the dog fight sequence.
   
Huey: Cancel it.
   
Jazmine: The PTA is threatening a boycott of the play since you fired all the kids.
   
Huey: (yawning) Don’t care.
   
Jazmine: And... the principal is in your office to talk about the script.
   
Huey: Who?
   
(later, in Huey's office)

Principal: First of all, I just wanted you to know we’re thrilled with the script.
   
Woman 1: Absolutely fantastic.
   
Woman 2: Brilliant. Wouldn’t change a thing.
   
Principal: We just had a couple of notes.
   
Woman 1: One or two.
   
Woman 2: Nothing significant.
   
Principal: (flipping through the script) Lets see, uh, there’s a typo on page five; uh, there’s a continuity problem on page 32 — I think that scene’s supposed to be at night — and, let's see, umm... oh yeah, um, and, uh, Jesus can’t be black.
   
Huey: What do you mean he can’t be black?
   
Principal: He can't be black. Maybe we can make Jesus another color.
   
Woman 1: How bout white?
   
Huey: But Jesus was black.
   
Woman 2: We could probably do Italian.
   
Principal: Jesus was Middle Eastern.
   
Huey: In addition to Arabs, the Middle East has always had many people of African descent, whom you would consider black.
   
Principal: Sorry, can’t do it.
   
Huey: (Clears throat, presents contract)
   
Principal: Oh right, that. (he tears it to pieces)
   
Principal: (leaving) Best of luck.
   
Woman 1: (leaving) Break a leg.
   
Woman 2: (leaving) I can't wait for opening night.
   
(camera shows a disappointed Huey with a poster behind him that reveals the chosen title for his play: The Adventures of Black Jesus)


--The Boondocks: "A Huey Freeman Christmas"

Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Irresponsible II

Huey: You want me to direct the Christmas play?
   
Mr. Uberwitz: Absolutely. I think you’ll do a fantastic job.
   
Huey: First of all, I don’t give a damn about Christmas.
   
Mr. Uberwitz: You don’t have to do a traditional Christmas play... no, you can do... whatever you want.
   
Huey: You’ll be fired.


Mr. Uberwitz: Fired? For what?
   
Huey: For bein’ an irresponsible white person.


--The Boondocks: "A Huey Freeman Christmas"

Monday, December 21, 2015

Asunder

Mr. Uberwitz: I would really love to see your vision.

Huey: Vision? What do you know about my vision? My vision would turn your world upside-down, tear asunder your illusions and the sanctuary of your own ignorance crashing down around you. Ask yourself... are you really ready to see that vision?

--The Boondocks: "A Huey Freeman Christmas"

Sunday, December 20, 2015

Disquieting

"At this point we find ourselves confronted by a very disquieting question: Do we really wish to act upon our knowledge?"
--Aldous Huxley, "Brave New World Revisited"

Saturday, December 19, 2015

Opposition II

"No government can be long secure without a formidable opposition. It reduces their supporters to that tractable number which can be managed by the joint influences of fruition and hope. It offers vengeance to the discontented, and distinction to the ambitious; and employs the energies of aspiring spirits, who otherwise may prove traitors in a division or assassins in a debate."
--Benjamin Disraeli

Friday, December 18, 2015

Assertive

"The best defense against usurpatory government is an assertive citizenry."
--William F. Buckley,
"Windfall : The End of the Affair" (1992).

Thursday, December 17, 2015

False II

"I would like to call upon America to be more careful with its trust ... and prevent those ... because of short-sightedness and still others out of self-interest, from falsely using the struggle for peace and for social justice to lead you down a false road. Because they are trying to weaken you; they are trying to disarm your strong and magnificent country in the face of this fearful threat. ... I call upon you: ordinary working men of America ... do not let yourselves become weak."
--Alexander Solzhenitsyn
June 30, 1975

Wednesday, December 16, 2015

Designed

"Our schools have been scientifically designed to prevent over-education from happening. The average American [should be] content with their humble role in life, because they're not tempted to think about any other role."
--William T. Harris U.S. Commissioner of Education Source: 1889

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Monuments

"First they ignore you. Then they ridicule you. And then they attack you and want to burn you. And then they build monuments to you."
--Nicholas Klein
1918 address to the Amalgamated Clothing Workers

Monday, December 14, 2015

Perpetual V

"[Tyrannical] power is absolute, minute, regular, provident and mild. It would be like the authority of a parent if, like that authority, its object was to prepare men for manhood; but it seeks, on the contrary, to keep them in perpetual childhood: it is well content that the people should rejoice, provided they think of nothing but rejoicing. For their happiness such a government willingly labors, but it chooses to be the sole agent and the only arbiter of that happiness; it provides for their security, foresees and supplies their necessities, facilitates their pleasures, manages their principal concerns, directs their industry, regulates the descent of property, and subdivides their inheritances: what remains, but to spare them all the care of thinking and all the trouble of living?"
--Alexis de Tocqueville
[Alexis Charles Henri Maurice Clerel, le Comte de Tocqueville] (1805-1859) French historian

Sunday, December 13, 2015

Easier III

"It is easier to rob by setting up a bank than by holding up a bank clerk"
--Bertolt Brecht 

Saturday, December 12, 2015

Sleep II

"I love sleep. My life has the tendency to fall apart when I'm awake, you know?"
--Ernest Hemingway

Friday, December 11, 2015

Preservation

"There are all kinds of devices invented for the protection and preservation of countries: defensive barriers, forts, trenches, and the like... But prudent minds have as a natural gift one safeguard which is the common possession of all, and this applies especially to the dealings of democracies.  What is this safeguard? Skepticism. This you must preserve.  This you must retain.  If you can keep this, you need fear no harm."
--Demosthenes (384 B.C.-322 B.C.)
Source: Oration

Thursday, December 10, 2015

Faculties

"In short, is not liberty the freedom of every person to make full use of his faculties, so long as he does not harm other persons while doing so? Is not liberty the destruction of all despotism -- including, of course, legal despotism? Finally, is not liberty the restricting of the law only to its rational sphere of organizing the right of the individual to lawful self- defense; of punishing injustice?"
--Frederic Bastiat
(1801-1850) [Claude Frederic Bastiat] French economist, statesman, and author. He did most of his writing during the years just before -- and immediately following -- the French Revolution of February 1848
Source: What Is Liberty? "The Law" by Frederic Bastiat (1848)

Wednesday, December 09, 2015

Nature III

Dr. Crusher: Computer, what is the nature of the universe?
Computer: The universe is a spheroid region, 705 meters in diameter.
  
--Star Trek: The Next Generation, "Remember Me"

Tuesday, December 08, 2015

Befogged

"But he saw too that in America the struggle was befogged by the fact that the worst Fascists were they who disowned the word 'Fascism' and preached enslavement to Capitalism under the style of Constitutional and Traditional Native American Liberty."
--Sinclair Lewis, "It Can't Happen Here"

Monday, December 07, 2015

Moneyed

"War against a foreign country only happens when the moneyed classes think they are going to profit from it."
--George Orwell

Sunday, December 06, 2015

Indistinguishable

"A professional politician is a professionally dishonorable man. In order to get anywhere near high office he has to make so many compromises and submit to so many humiliations that he becomes indistinguishable from a streetwalker."
--H.L. Mencken

Saturday, December 05, 2015

Believable

"In a political sense, there is one problem that currently underlies all of the others. That problem is making Government sufficiently responsive to the people. If we don't make government responsive to the people, we don't make it believable. And we must make government believable if we are to have a functioning democracy."
--Gerald R. Ford

Friday, December 04, 2015

Control V

The usual people tried to claim responsibility.

First the IRA, then the PLO and the Gas Board. Even British Nuclear Fuelsrushed out a statement to the effect that the situation was completely under control, that it was a one in a million chance, that there was hardly any radioactive leakage at all, and that the site of the explosion would make a nice location for a day out with the kids and a picnic, before finally having to admit that it wasn't actually anything to do with them at all.

--Douglas Adams, "The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul" (1988)

Thursday, December 03, 2015

Ape

"The most perfect ape cannot draw an ape; only man can do that; but, likewise, only man regards the ability to do this as a sign of superiority."
--Georg C. Lichtenberg 

Wednesday, December 02, 2015

Spirits II

"I urge you to examine in your own mind the assumptions which must lay behind using the police power to insist that once-sovereign spirits have no choice but to submit to being schooled by strangers."
--John Taylor Gatto

Tuesday, December 01, 2015

Arbitrary

"Whenever destroyers appear among men, they start by destroying money, for money is men's protection and the base of a moral existence. Destroyers seize gold and leave to its owners a counterfeit pile of paper. This kills all objective standards and delivers men into the arbitrary power of an arbitrary setter of values. Gold was an objective value, an equivalent of wealth produced. Paper is a mortgage on wealth that does not exist, backed by a gun aimed at those who are expected to produce it. Paper is a check drawn by legal looters upon an account which is not theirs: upon the virtue of the victims. Watch for the day when it bounces, marked: 'Account Overdrawn.'"
--Ayn Rand
(1905-1982) Author
Source: Atlas Shrugged, p. 385-386, (1957)