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, March 20, 2010

A Power to Persuade | The Weekly Standard

A Power to Persuade | The Weekly Standard
This front page article is a double book review about Glamour by Virginia Postrel, one of the most remarkable people alive today.
She's the past editor of REASON Magazine, when it was truly a smart read and at its zenith. She has written two insightful books that explain remarkable subtleties in how our world is shaped and now posts and writes two blogs, Dynamist (http://www.dynamist.com/weblog/index.html) and Deep Glamour (http://www.deepglamour.net/). Deep Glamour is a mixture of style, taste and some of the little unseen bizarre and a bit of the disturbing.
But most of all she is humanity herself. Her colleague Dr. Sally Satel was dying of kidney failure. When Dr. Satel's potential donors backed out and her situation became profoundly serious, Virginia Postrel offered her Kidney with an attitude as if she were making a simple passage expected in everyday life. She made a remarkable passage indeed! Unrelated to her kidney gift, Virginia Postrel later suffered breast cancer.
These two things both scare the hell out of me...and I groom, ride and/or jump my 1,250 lb. horse, who can kill me faster than I can say rear and kick. Bravery has its own armour.
A couple of years ago I happened to see her briefly at the LA Times Book-faire of C-SPAN's Book-TV. I noticed how tired she appeared and how she had seemed to age suddenly. I had not been aware at that time of her kidney donation and breast cancer. A few weeks ago she appeared with Sally Satel on John Stossel's FoxBiz TV show. She was back to her lovely, vital self, albeit with a little gray.
Here is a video interview Virginia Postrel made at REASON.TV about cancer drugs and health care reform.
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