Monday, December 22, 2014

From the book of My name is Asher lev............

He should be careful of 

the influence of those 

with whom he consorts,

and he runs a great risk in 

becoming a member of 

a large society,

for large bodies then towards 

the leveling of individuality to 

a common consent,

the forming and adherence to 

a creed.

            *      *      *      *       *

You can do anything you want to do,

what is rare is this actual wanting 

to do a specific thing:

wanting it so much that you are 

practically blind to

all other things,

that nothing else will satisfy you.

             *      *      *      *      *

An artist has got to get acquainted 

with himself

just as much as he can.

It is not easy job

for it is not a present-day 

habit of humanity.

             *       *      *      *      *

Every great artist is a man

who has freed himself from 

his family

his nation, his race.

Every man who has shown 

the world the way to beauty,

to true culture, has been rebel

A "universal with out patritiosm", 

with out home"

Who has found 

his people every where.

Sunday, December 21, 2014

Quote of the day..........

Liberty and Love, 

They are all I need. 

For Love I sacrifice my Life 

For liberty I sacrifice my Love. 

--Sandor Petofi. 1823-1849.
Hungary's National poet.
His Twelve point manifesto called for
the Civil Liberties embodied in the US Bill of Rights.

In Propagand..........

Sometimes In propaganda

Imitations far outweigh

The original in rhetoric.

Sunday, December 14, 2014

Conspiracy.........

Knowledge is diversity

Prejudice is conspiracy.

Thursday, December 11, 2014

One more systemic subject...........

A Homeless person is a systemic subject 

not an accident in any given society.

The institutions that govern homeless might be of 

A bureaucracy in obscurity but 

It is a Person/ Human that overseas and decides  

who becomes and remains Homeless.

           *       *      *      *      *

Give me your tired, your poor, 

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, 


The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. 


Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me: 


I lift my lamp beside the golden door.


-- Emma Lazarus(1849-1887) American poet.


Source: "The New Colossus", a sonnet written in 1883;

Appears on a bronze plaque in the pedestal of 
the Statue of Liberty placed in 1903

Quote of the day..........

The whole modern world has divided itself into

Conservatives and Progressives.
 
The business of Progressives is to go on

making mistakes.

The business of Conservatives is

to prevent mistakes from being corrected.

Even when the revolutionist might

himself repent of his revolution,the traditionalist is

already defending it as part of his tradition.

Thus we have two great types --

the advanced person who rushes us into ruin,

and the retrospective person who admires the ruins.

He admires them especially by moonlight,

not to say moonshine.

Each new blunder of the progressive or prig becomes

instantly a legend of immemorial antiquity for the snob.

This is called the balance, or mutual check,

in our Constitution.

~ Gilbert Keith Chesterton
(1874-1936) British essayist, critic, poet, and novelist
Illustrated London News, 1924

Quote of the day.......

In all affairs it’s a healthy thing now and then

to hang a question mark on the things

you have long taken for granted.

~ Bert rand Russell
(1872-1970) Philosopher, educator

Quote of the day..........

Attack another’s rights and 

you destroy your own.

-- John Jay Chapman(1862-1933).
 American Essayist and Poet

             *     *     *     *     *

In questions of science 

the authority of a thousand is

not worth the humble reasoning of 

a single individual.

-- Galileo Galilei
Astronomer (1564 - 1642)

Irredeemable self...........

When one's respective sins out weigh  

the very humanity one professes 

then the action of others

whether be right or wrong matters little.

Friday, December 05, 2014

Quote of the Day....../ The gravest danger.......

This is the gravest danger

that today threatens civilization:

State intervention, 

the absorption of all spontaneous 

social effort by the State;

that is to say, of spontaneous 

historical action,

which in the long-run sustains, 

nourishes and impels 

human destinies.

 -José Ortega y Gasset(1883-1955) 
Spanish philosopher
Source: Espana Invertebrada, 1922

             *      *     *     *     * 

But to manipulate men, 

to propel them toward goals

which you -- the social reformers -- see, 

but they may not,

is to deny their human essence,

to treat them as objects 

without wills of their own,

and therefore to degrade them.

-- Isaiah Berlin (1909-1997)
Source: Two Concepts of Liberty, 1958

Quote of the day............

A man’s liberties are none 

the less aggressed upon 

because those who coerce him 

do so in the belief 

that he will be benefited.

-Herbert Spencer(1820-1903)
Economist, philosopher
Source: The Principles of Ethics 

Wednesday, December 03, 2014

Quote of the day...........

Facts matter, that's all that matters.

People often times in very hot issues —

like race or gender — they take sides;

that's so wrong.

We have to wait for the facts.

 Facts really, really, matter.

It's painful, but people just take sides.

-- Greta Van Susteren.
American commentator.

Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Silent catalog..........

In a world that privillages it self

in violation of other's lives

price for one's silence and

profiteering through office

is indexed like a catalog.

Tuesday, November 04, 2014

Quote of the day.....

Most men are followers, and implicitly rely 

upon the judgment of others.

They mistake solemnity for wisdom, and 

regard a grave countenance as the title page and 

Preface to a most learned volume. 

So they are easily imposed upon by forms, 

strange garments, and solemn ceremonies. 

And when the teaching of parents, 

the customs of neighbors, and 

the general tongue approve and 

justify a belief or creed, no matter how absurd, 

it is hard even for the strongest to hold 

the citadel of his soul. 

In each country, in defence of each religion, 

the same arguments would be urged.

-- Robert G. Ingersoll
(1833-1899) American political leader, orator
Source: The Great Infidels (1881)

Thursday, October 09, 2014

Quote of the day........

It is proof of a base and low mind for 

One to wish to think with the masses or majority,

merely because the majority is the majority.

Truth does not change because it is, or is not, 

believed by a majority of the people.

-- Giordano Bruno(1548-1699)
Source: On Shadows of Ideas


Quote of the day...........

If I am not for myself, Who will be for me ?

If I am not for others, Who am I ?

And if not now, when ?

-- rabbi Hillel ( 110 BC- 10 AD )

        *    *    *    *    *

Only a mediocre writer is always at his best.

-- Somerset Maugham.

This is It --Tich Nhat Hanh......

In the middle of the night

Like a drowning man

holding on to a blade of grass

seizing on a fleeting thought

to immemorialize  ones wits end

scribiling on blindly in darkness

hoping for a new dawn.

Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Quote of the day................

When we remember

we are all mad,

the mysteries disappear

and life stands explained.

-- Mark Twain
[Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835-1910)

Thursday, September 25, 2014

Quote of the day....

[T]here is nothing more difficult to carry out, 

nor more doubtful of success, 

nor more dangerous to handle, 

than to initiate a new order of things.  

For the reformer has enemies in all those 

who profit by the old order, and 

only lukewarm defenders in all those

 who would profit by the new order.

-- Niccolo Machiavelli
(1469-1527) Italian Statesman and Political Philosopher.

Tuesday, September 23, 2014

Quote of the day........

The fishermen know that the sea is dangerous 

and the storm terrible,

but they have never found these dangers 

sufficient reason for remaining ashore.

-- Vincent van Gogh.

Thursday, September 18, 2014

Quote of the day...........

If you would be a real seeker after truth,

it is necessary that at least once in your life

you doubt, as far as possible, all things.

-- Rene Descartes
(1596-1650) French philosopher
Source: Principles of Philosophy, 1644

              *     *     *     *     *

[When] Men are not allowed to think freely

about chemistry and biology,

why should they be allowed to think freely

about political philosophy?

-- Auguste Comte.
Isidore Marie Auguste François Xavier Comte(1798-1857) 
French philosopher, founder of Positivism and Sociology
Source: The Positive Philosophy, 1830-40

              *     *     *     *     *

The free-thinking of one age is 

the common sense of the next.

-- Matthew Arnold (1822-1887)

Wednesday, September 17, 2014

Quote of the day.............

The heart of the liberal philosophy

is a belief in the dignity of the individual,

in his freedom to make the most of his capacities

and opportunities according to his own lights...

This implies a belief in the equality of man in one sense;

in their inequality in another."

-- Milton Friedman

(1912-2006) Nobel Prize-winning economist, 
economic advisor to President Ronald Reagan,
 "ultimate guru of the free-market system"
Source: Capitalism and Freedom, 1962

Monday, September 15, 2014

Quote of the day.........

You make men love 

their government and 

their country by giving them 

the kind of government 

and the kind of country 

that inspire respect and love; 

a country that is free and unafraid, 

that lets the discontented talk 

in order to learn the causes of 

their discontent and end those causes, 

that refuses to impel men to spy 

on their neighbors, 

that protects its citizens vigorously 

from harmful acts 

while it leaves the remedies for 

objectionable ideas 

to counter-argument and time.

-- Zecharian Chafee, Jr.(1865-1957)
Source: Free Speech in the United States, 1942

Thursday, September 11, 2014

Quote of the day.....

The highest manifestation of 

life consists in this:

that a being governs its own actions.

A thing which is always subject to 

the direction of another is 

somewhat of a dead thing.

-- Saint Thomas Aquinas(1225-1274).
 Italian philosopher and theologian

       *       *       *       *       *

To learn who rules over you,

simply find out who you are 

not allowed to criticize.

-- Voltaire
[François Marie Arouet] (1694-1778)

Friday, September 05, 2014

Quote of the day.....

A wise man neither suffers 

himself to be governed,

nor attempts to govern others.

-- Jean de la Bruyere.

quote of the day..........

May the Declaration of Independence

be to the world, what I believe it will be 

(to some parts sooner,

to others later, but finally to all)

the signal of arousing men to burst 

the chains under which monkish ignorance and 

superstition had persuaded them 

to bind themselves, and to assume 

the blessings and security of self-government. 

That form which we have substituted, 

restores the free right to the unbounded

exercise of reason and freedom of opinion. 

All eyes are opened, or opening, 

to the rights of man.

-- Thomas Jefferson(1743-1826). 
US Founding Father, 3rd US President
drafted the Declaration of Independence.

Thursday, August 28, 2014

Quote of the day.......

No man is justified in doing evil

on the ground of expediency.

-- Theodore Roosevelt(1858-1919) 
26th US President.

Thursday, August 14, 2014

Carpe diem.......

Next to the swans nesting

By the lake side - eerie and surreal

Under the shadows of giant trees

That stood mourning through the night

Keeping a vigil, lighting a candle

People flowing in the streets streaming

The colored chalks glowing

With thoughts and words flowing

For good will hunting


There rises a memorial for 

The spirit’s resting.

Monday, August 04, 2014

Quote of the day........

Finally, the fundamental flaw, 

which will ultimately destroy 

this prohibition as it did the last one, 

is that criminal sanctions cannot, 

and should not attempt to, 

prohibit personal conduct 

which does no harm to others. 

-- Judge Robert Sweet
(U.S. District Ct., N.Y.)
Source: February 12, 1996, National Review

          *       *        *       *        *

From the standpoint of freedom of 

speech and the press,

it is enough to point out that 

the state has no legitimate interest in 

protecting any or all religions 

from views distasteful to them...

It is not the business of government 

to suppress real or imagined attacks 

upon a particular religious doctrine.

-- Justice Tom C. Clark.
(1899-1977) U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Burstyn v. Wilson, 1952

           *         *         *         *         *

Rightful liberty is unobstructed action 

according to our will within limits 

drawn around us by 

the equal rights of others. 

I do not add 'within the limits of the law,' 

because law is often but the tyrant's will, and

always so when it violates 

the rights of the individual.

-- Thomas Jefferson, 3rd US President.
(1743-1826), US Founding Father.
Drafted the Declaration of Independence.

Saturday, July 26, 2014

Being Sad..........

In rejecting or in even fighting, being sad

will only lead one to be silly.

Thursday, July 24, 2014

Roosevelt's Four freedoms ......


If the Congress maintains these principles, 

the voters,putting patriotism 

ahead of pocketbooks, 

will give you their applause.

In the future days, 

which we seek to make secure, 

we look forward to a world founded upon 

four essential human freedoms.


The first is freedom of speech and expression —

everywhere in the world.


The second is freedom of every person to 

worship God in his own way — 

everywhere in the world.


The third is freedom from want — 

which, translated into world terms, 

means economic understandings 

which will secure to every nation 

a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants — 

everywhere in the world.


The fourth is freedom from fear – 

which, translated into world terms, 

means a world-wide reduction of armaments 

to such a point and in such a thorough 

fashion that no nation will be in 

a position to commit an act of 

physical aggression against any neighbor —

anywhere in the world.


That is no vision of a distant millennium. 

It is a definite basis for a kind of world 

attainable in our own time and generation.


That kind of world is the very antithesis of 

the so-called new order of tyranny 

which the dictators seek to create with 

the crash of a bomb.

To that new order we oppose 

the greater conception – 

the moral order. 


A good society is able to face schemes of 

world domination and foreign revolutions 

alike without fear.


Since the beginning of our American history, 

we have been engaged in change —  

in a perpetual peaceful revolution —

a revolution which goes on steadily,

quietly adjusting itself to changing conditions —

without the concentration camp or 

the quick-lime in the ditch. 


The world order which we seek is 

the cooperation of free countries,

working together in a friendly, civilized society.


This nation has placed its destiny in 

the hands and heads and hearts of 

its millions of free men and women; and

its faith in freedom under the guidance of God. 


Freedom means the supremacy of 

human rights everywhere. 


Our support goes to those who struggle 

to gain those rights and keep them. 


Our strength is our unity of purpose.

To that high concept 

there can be no end save victory.

Quote of the day.............

"Those who suppress freedom always do so 

in the name of law and order."

-- John V. Lindsay
(1921-2000) U.S. Congressman, Mayor of New York City

         *    *    *    *    *

"It is not the business of the law

 to make anyone good or reverent or 

moral or clean or upright."

-- Murray N. Rothbard
(1926-1995) Dean of the Austrian School of Economics

Monday, July 21, 2014

In Grace...........

Even in order to make a claim and

To enjoy the fruits of ones doing

Either right or wrong......

One has to take the responsibility 

For one’s actions.........

Without which one is reduced to live 

A life that is parasitic........

No matter what identity or 

Worldly position one bears.........

And as such a life that in its wants and 

Unfulfilled desires brings 

Only misery as karmic bondage

And a life devoid of....... 

True moral and ethical standing

That define the best of human nature and

Some significance to...... 

The natural order of reality

Is a life outside of divine grace.

Quote of the day......

The theologian who is satisfied with his complete 

and conclusive thought is mediocre.

A good theologian and a philosopher is open ,or 

incomplete in thought,

always open to the maius ( moreness) of God 

and of the truth,always in development.

-Pope Francis.

Thursday, July 17, 2014

In reflection of Purva Mimansa.

Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of 

Our intelligence by means of language.

----Ludwig Wittgenstein.

Source-  Nathan Greenslit. Harvard university.


Wednesday, July 16, 2014

Quote of the Day........

All ideas having even the slightest 

redeeming social importance --

unorthodox ideas, controversial ideas, 

even ideas hateful to the

prevailing climate of opinion, 

have the full protection of the

guarantees [of the First Amendment].

-- Justice William J. Brennan
(1906-1997) U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Roth v. United States, 1957

          *        *        *        *         *

"Since when do you have to 

agree with people

to defend them from injustice?"

-- Lillian Hellman(1905-1984).
 American playwright and memoirist.

         *        *         *        *         *

You seem ... to consider the judges as 

the ultimate arbiters of 

all constitutional questions; 

a very dangerous doctrine indeed, 

and one which would place us under 

the despotism of an oligarchy... 

The Constitution has erected 

no such single tribunal.

-- Thomas Jefferson.
(1743-1826), US Founding Father, 
drafted the Declaration of Independence.

Making of Mischief...........

All mischief is momentary

If we do not lend ourselves to it

It will pass, losing its momentum.

Friday, July 11, 2014

Quote of the Day...........

    
A people who extend civil liberties 

only to preferred groups 

start down the path 

either to dictatorship of 

the right or the left.

Wednesday, July 09, 2014

Beauty ? Art ....

What is mostly desired after 

has to be corrupted ( by the market forces )

To be mundanely accessible.

Friday, June 27, 2014

Quote of the day......

Concepts of justice

must have hands and feet or

they remain sterile abstractions.

The hands and feet we need

are efficient means and methods 

to carry out justice in every case

in the shortest possible time

and at the lowest possible cost.

-- Justice Warren E. Burger(1907-1995).
 Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court (1969-86)

           *        *        *        *        *
 
By freethinking I mean the use of 

the understanding in endeavoring to 

find out the meaning of 

any proposition whatsoever, 

in considering the nature of the evidence 

for or against, and in judging of it 

according to the seeming force or 

weakness of the evidence.

-- Anthony Collins(1676-1729).
Source: A Discourse of Freethinking, 1713.

Monday, June 23, 2014

Quote of the day.....

Protection, therefore, 

against the tyranny of 

the magistrate is not enough;

there needs protection against 

the tyranny of 

the prevailing opinion and feeling,

against the tendency of society to impose,

by other means than civil penalties,

its own ideas and practices 

as rules of conduction 

those who dissent from them.

 John Stuart Mill(1806-1873) 
 Source: On Liberty, 1859

         *          *         *         *        *

It is a maxim among lawyers 

that whatever hath been done before 

may be done again, and 

therefore they take special care 

to record all the decisions 

formerly made against 

common justice and 

the general reason of mankind. 

These, under the name of precedents,

they produce as authorities to justify 

the most iniquitous opinions, and 

the judges never fail of directing 

them accordingly. 

Jonathan Swift(1667-1745)
 Source: Gulliver’s Travels, 1726

           *         *        *        *        *

You do not examine legislation 

in the light of the benefits 

it will convey 

if properly administered, but 

in the light of the wrongs

it would do and the harm 

it would cause 

if improperly administered.

Lyndon B. Johnson(1908-1973) 
37th US President (1963-1969)