and I quote

NB: I don't necessarily subscribe to all of the following

Barry Goldwater on extremism and moderation

"I would remind you that extremism in defense of liberty is no vice. And let me also remind you that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue." --at the Republican National Convention, July 1964

protesting against human rights abuses in Argentina

"Our tragedy is that we have no real sense of 'we' in this country... Most people who protested against human rights violations during the dictatorship did so only after their own kin disappeared, not those of their neighbors. They protested as victims, not as citizens." --assistant to Argentine president Raoul Alfonsin

Martin Niemoeller (1892-1984) on speaking up

"In Germany they came first for the communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up." http://www.us-israel.org/jsource/biography/niemoeller.html (11/12/99)

a Samarkand potter on planning

"Planning before work protects you from regret" -- inscription on a 10th c. plate (Samarkand?), St. Louis Art Museum

the plate

George Smathers on Claude Pepper

Though he denied ever saying it, in its obituary of George Smathers (D, FL) the New York Times (21 Jan 07) says that in his campaign for the the Senate, he accused his opponent, Claude Pepper, of various moral failings:  “Do you know that Claude Pepper is known all over Washington as a shameless extrovert?....Not only that, but this man is reliably reported to practice nepotism with his sister-in-law and he has a sister who was once a thespian in wicked New York. Worst of all, it is an established fact that Mr. Pepper, before his marriage, habitually practiced celibacy.”

Mao Tse Tung on revolution

A revolution is not a dinner party, or writing an essay, or painting a picture, or doing embroidery; it cannot be so refined, so leisurely and gentle, so temperate, kind, courteous, restrained and magnanimous. A revolution is an insurrection, an act of violence by which one class overthrows another. — From: Report on an Investigation of the Peasant Movement in Hunan

Never write if you can speak; never speak if you can nod; never nod if you can wink. -- Martin Lomasney (1859-1933)