Quotes

"Fascism and communism both promise "social welfare," "social justice," and "fairness" to justify authoritarian means and extensive arbitrary and discretionary governmental powers." - F. A. Hayek"

"Life is a Bungling process and in no way educational." in James M. Cain

Jean Giraudoux who first said, “Only the mediocre are always at their best.”

If you have ten thousand regulations, you destroy all respect for the law. Sir Winston Churchill

"summum ius summa iniuria" ("More laws, more injustice.") Cicero

As Christopher Hitchens once put it, “The essence of tyranny is not iron law; it is capricious law.”

"Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it." Ronald Reagan

"Law is where you buy it." Raymond Chandler

"Why did God make so many damn fools and Democrats?" Clarence Day

"If I feel like feeding squirrels to the nuts, this is the place for it." - Cluny Brown

"Oh, pshaw! When yu' can't have what you choose, yu' just choose what you have." Owen Wister "The Virginian"

Oscar Wilde said about the death scene in Little Nell, you would have to have a heart of stone not to laugh.

Thomas More's definition of government as "a conspiracy of rich men procuring their own commodities under the name and title of a commonwealth.” ~ Winston S. Churchill, A History of the English Speaking Peoples

“Laws are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.” ~ Jonathon Swift

Saturday, July 7, 2012

On What's So Scary About Darwin? Short answer: He dethroned us.

Charles Darwin
People rarely read Darwin today, but his books are thoughtful and not threatening, especially "On the Origin of Species." Darwin is careful in his exposition in the theories that are filled with personal, scientific examples. His books are as fascinating to read in the same way that the viewing the great naturalist's etchings from that same period are. Darwin, for me, was a great, albeit gentle, awakening. It was my road to a sense of peace as to who we are and where we fit in. It was my 'road to Damascus.'

John Derbyshire On What's So Scary About Darwin? | VDARE.com
By John Derbyshire on June 28, 2012

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. We are assembled here this weekend to discuss the future of the study of human biodiversity, which I think all of us here customarily abbreviate to "HBD."
HBD is of course merely a subtopic within the larger subject of bio-diversity in general—"BD," if you like—a subject that began to pass from the realm of observation, classification, and speculation into the realm of rigorous scientific inquiry when Charles Darwinpublished his book On the Origin of Species 153 years ago. Twelve years later Darwin ventured into the subtopic of HBD with another book, The Descent of Man.
Both books generated much vexation and controversy. Many people are still vexed today, over a century later. Why? What's so scary about Darwin?
1. Short answer: He dethroned us.
The world used to be for us and about us. I have remarkedelsewhere that “the ordinary modes of human thinking are magical, religious, social, and personal.”
The rise of science removed us from our central position in creation, not once but again and again. René Descartes lamented (well, it always strikes me as a lament) in 1642 that:
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