Children and the State

In my social media travails I've run into the following quote, attributed to Adolf Hitler:

It [the State] must declare the child to be the most precious treasure of the people. . . .  And conversely it must be considered reprehensible: to withhold healthy children from the nation. Here the state must act as the guardian of a millennial future in the face of which the wishes and the selfishness of the individual must appear as nothing and submit.

I was trying to find if this was in fact what was said, since the current progressives in the U.S. seem to be spouting the same line.  It appears to be from Mein Kampf, and Project Gutenberg in Australia has one translation:

It must proclaim the truth that the child is the most valuable possession a people can have. It must see to it that only those who are healthy shall beget children; that there is only one infamy, namely, for parents that are ill or show hereditary defects to bring children into the world and that in such cases it is a high honour to refrain from doing so. But, on the other hand, it must be considered as reprehensible conduct to refrain from giving healthy children to the nation. In this matter the State must assert itself as the trustee of a millennial future, in face of which the egotistic desires of the individual count for nothing and will have to give way before the ruling of the State.

Pretty sick stuff, to lay claim to others' children.

It's odd that the main Project Gutenberg doesn't have the text of Mein Kampf.  Afraid people will read it and be disgusted with the modern-day progs?

Epigrams

Apparently many famous epigrams that are used in everyday English derive from the writings of one John Heywood.  To wit (from Wikipedia):

• What you have, hold.
• Haste maketh waste. (1546)
• Out of sight out of mind. (1542)
• When the sun shineth, make hay. (1546)
• Look ere ye leap. (1546)
• Two heads are better than one. (1546)
• Love me, love my dog. (1546)
• Beggars should be no choosers. (1546)
• All is well that ends well. (1546)
• The fat is in the fire. (1546)
• I know on which side my bread is buttered. (1546)
• One good turn asketh another. (1546)
• A penny for your thought. (1546)
• Rome was not built in one day. (1546)
• Better late than never. (1546)
• An ill wind that bloweth no man to good. (1546)
• The more the merrier. (1546)
• You cannot see the wood for the trees. (1546)
• This hitteth the nail on the head. (1546)
• No man ought to look a given horse in the mouth. (1546)
• Tread a woorme on the tayle and it must turne agayne. (1546)
• Many hands make light work. (1546)
• Wolde ye bothe eate your cake and haue your cake? (1562)
• When he should get aught, each finger is a thumb. (1546)

Some are phrased in outdated English, but it's amazing how these epigrams endure some 470 years later.

Paul Revere's Legacy

Via someone on the Appleseed forums (Transform), I learned of an interview of the author of Paul Revere's Ride, David Hackett Fischer, where he voices something that occurred to me when I read the book:

I think he had a message for us as well. To me, the interest of the story is partly that. I think we can see a kind of message, first of all, in what he was doing. For me it was mainly the kind of collective effort in that cause of freedom, and we forgot about that. We forgot about both sides of it, sometimes. I think people on the left today, some of my colleagues at academe, tend to forget about American ideas of freedom. People on the right tend to forget about collective action. Paul Revere and his friends brought those two things together, and I think that's a message for us.

Yeah.

Libertarian with a Small 'L'

"I am a libertarian with a small 'l' and a Republican with a capital 'R.'  And I am a Republican with a capital 'R' on grounds of expediency, not on principle." (Milton Friedman)

It's amazing to find that an opinion one has arrived at after considerable deliberation not only is shared by others, but was thought of before one was even aware of the existence of such things.

On Morons

Perusing the Interwebz, I came across a bit of wit from H.L. Mencken:

"As democracy is perfected, the office of President represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last, and the White House will be occupied by a downright moron."

-- H.L. Mencken, The Baltimore Evening Sun, July 26, 1920

This reminds me of a line from the movie Blazing Saddles:

People of the land. The common clay. You know: morons.

Tradition

"[Tradition] cannot be inherited, and if you want it, you must obtain it by great labour."
--T.S. Eliot, from Tradition and the Individual Talent

The "War" on "Terror"

Excellent.

There is no War on Terror. If there was, the whole nation would be told to take up arms. Everybody would be armed, even on aircraft. Inexpensive AK47s would be stored in every closet, much like arms are stored in homes all over Switzerland because the Swiss government has nothing to fear from its populace. There is only a war against our freedom in the name of a created threat that doesn't exist. We have been duped into surrendering our liberty in the false name of security by a government that sends us out into the "War On Terror" unarmed because we cannot be trusted with guns. The most basic of all rights is the right of self defense against criminal attacks. A great equalizer between the weak and the strong, guns in the hands of women could reduce assaults upon them by stronger male attackers by 80%. How can it be said that women have equal rights if they cannot carry, yet Dianne Feinstein, Barbara Boxer, Hillary Clinton and Laura Bush all hide behind guns for their protection because they're much more important than our wives, sisters and daughters? Again, the only 'war' is on our freedoms.  (Jack Duggan, "The Bear That's There")

Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs died today.  I liked his company's products, and although I didn't care for his politics, his philosophy, as quoted in the press, is something that I can appreciate.  On television:

When you're young, you look at television and think, There's a conspiracy. The networks have conspired to dumb us down. But when you get a little older, you realize that's not true. The networks are in business to give people exactly what they want. That's a far more depressing thought. Conspiracy is optimistic! You can shoot the bastards! We can have a revolution! But the networks are really in business to give people what they want. It's the truth.

On work:

Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

On death:

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

Adversity

"Scorn poverty: no one is as poor as he was at birth. Scorn pain: either it will go away or you will. Scorn death: either it finishes you or it transforms you." (Lucius Annaeus Seneca)

I saw the middle sentence somewhere and tracked down the quote.  Good stuff, and there's more on that site.

Iron Law of Bureaucracy

In reading a comment regarding the NRA on a gun blog, I became aware of an concise statement by author Jerry Pournelle regarding how bureaucracies end up:

"Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy states that in any bureaucratic organization there will be two kinds of people: those who work to further the actual goals of the organization, and those who work for the organization itself. Examples in education would be teachers who work and sacrifice to teach children, vs. union representative who work to protect any teacher including the most incompetent. The Iron Law states that in all cases, the second type of person will always gain control of the organization, and will always write the rules under which the organization functions."

That perfectly describes why the NRA is so ineffective. I'm a member because of their useful functions (like education). However, I no longer support the PVF or ILA, because in many instances they back the wrong candidates. I'd rather pick the candidates I support. So these days I think of my NRA membership as if it were a magazine subscription to American Rifleman, with a few gun club-like benefits on the side.

On the other hand, the Gun Owners of America (GOA) is an excellent force to protect gun rights: no compromise, as it should be.  Donation dollars that would've otherwise gone to the NRA will be going there.  The Jews for the Preservation for Firearms Ownership (JPFO) organization is similarly excellent.  (Rest in peace, Aaron Zelman.)

George Bernard Shaw

Found an old (2009.01.22) note to myself regarding some excellent sayings by George Bernard Shaw:

Hatred is the coward's revenge for being intimidated.

The more things a man is ashamed of, the more respectable he is.

The English have no respect for their language, and will not teach their children to speak it.

Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.

Brilliant!

Misquotes

Apparently several quotes often attributed to Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson are incorrect.

First of all, the Benjamin Franklin one. As referenced by Wikiquote and backed up by some scholarly research, this is the correct quote: "Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." Certainly that's different than the one generally seen floating about on the Net.

Jefferson is the subject of many mis-attributed quotes. One often attributed to him is: "When the government fears the people, there is liberty; When the people fear the government, there is tyranny." I rather liked that one, too, but apparently he didn't say it (also, Wikiquote).

Oh yeah, Nietzsche is also frequently misquoted. The proper quote is: "Was ihn nicht umbringt, macht ihn stärker" (What does not kill him, makes him stronger.)