Notable Quote Archives - Page 12 of 26

Notable Quote – Richard E. Wagner

January 17, 2020 Skip

Yet democracy and liberty cannot be complementary political values, at least not without significant effort at constitutional reconciliation. At base, democracy embraces the principle that majorities dominate minorities. In contrast, liberty is a principle of non-domination whereby interaction among people is governed by principles of private property and not by majority rule -Richard E. Wagner … Read more

Notable Quote – Prof. Don Boudreaux

January 15, 2020 Skip

I’m tired of hearing that anyone who refuses to embrace every proposal to tax carbon and to otherwise hamper markets in the name of ‘addressing’ climate change is an unscientific ideologue. Of course, some such people are, but it follows neither that every such person is, nor that the embrace of proposals to tax carbon … Read more

Notable Quote – Richard Wagner

January 14, 2020 Skip

The robust commercial republic that emerged through this constitution of liberty clearly warranted the designation of American exceptionalism. That exceptionalism has been under assault for around a century now as the consensual principle upon which the American regime was founded has come increasingly to give way to the factional principle, whereby government becomes an instrument … Read more

Notable Quote – Deirdre McCloskey

January 12, 2020 Skip

The High Liberal [Progressivism/Socialism -Skip] story is, in a few brief mottos to stand for a rich intellectual tradition since the 1880s: Modern life is complicated, and so we need government to regulate.

Notable Quote – James Buchanan and Roger Congleton

January 9, 2020January 9, 2020 Skip

It is evident that a constraint or limit on the taxing power or authority of government means little unless this constraint is also accompanied by constraints on the spending power. If a government can implement direct transfers in a discriminatory manner, then members of any ruling coalition can capture for themselves any desired share of … Read more

The “obvious and simple system of natural liberty.”

January 7, 2020 Skip

The supreme and inestimable merit of the exchange mechanism is that it enables a vast number of people to cooperate in the use of means to achieve ends as far as their interests are mutual, without arguing or in any way agreeing about either the ends or the methods of achieving them.

Notable Quote – EXACTLY my complaint against the Gilford Selectmen

January 6, 2020 Skip

Emphasis mine: Careful observers often and correctly note that, for many of its adherents, environmentalism is a religion. Too many environmentalists disregard inconvenient truths that would undermine their faith that calamities are percolating just over the horizon. It might well be that humans’ “footprint” on the Earth is larger than ever; it might even be … Read more

Notable Quote – F.A. Hayek

December 31, 2019 Skip

The whole conception of man, already endowed with a mind capable of conceiving civilization, set out to create that civilization as it was already preformed in his mind, is fundamentally false. Man does not simply impose upon nature a preformed mental pattern. His mind is itself a pattern constantly changing as a result of his … Read more

Notable Quote – Rod Liddle

December 30, 2019 Skip

OK, boomers — wassup? I’ll tell you wassup. This was the decade you got left behind. *** [C]is is short for cisgender and refers to someone whose current gender is the same as the one they were “assigned” at birth. Yes, I know — scientifically that means everyone. It’s all there in the chromosomes. It … Read more

Notable Quote – Prof. Don Boudreaux

December 16, 2019December 16, 2019 Skip

… I offer here a handy guide to common misconceptions about free-market “economic orthodoxy” – or to use a less-loaded term, “market economics.” – Market economics does not hold that money is all that matters. Quite the contrary. Competent economists understand better than most people that individuals have a large scope for, and a deep interest in, … Read more

Notable Quote – B.b.b.but, you’re not listening to us WARNING you about him!

December 15, 2019 Skip

I wonder how many people are like me and sympathize with Trump because he is bullied. I never liked Trump and I didn’t vote for him, but the continual attacks on him make me sympathetic. If this were a movie, he would be the hero, and the attackers are the smug “cool” kids who will … Read more

Notable Quote – Prof. Don Boudreaux

December 14, 2019December 14, 2019 Skip

He [J.D. Rockefeller, Sr.] was also insistent that his massive philanthropy paled in importance beside the good he had done in creating jobs and furnishing affordable kerosene at Standard Oil. DBx: Rockefeller was correct. Wealth cannot be philanthropically given away unless it is first created. Nor can wealth be “redistributed” by the state unless it … Read more

Notable Quote – NH State Rep Judy Aron (R-Sullivan County)

December 13, 2019 Skip

Concord, NH – New Hampshire State Representative Judy Aron (R-Sullivan 7) released the following statement regarding New Hampshire Democrats welcoming anti-Semite and anti-Israel Rep. Ilhan Omar with open arms: “New Hampshire Democrats have really gone too far, by bringing noted anti-Semite and opponent of Israel Rep. Ilhan Omar to New Hampshire, Democrats are showing how anti-Israel … Read more

Notable Quote – Dr. Bastiat

December 11, 2019 Skip

…At that point, no actions, no matter how drastic or ruthless, are off the table. Confronting and shaming people in public. Scaring the families of prominent conservatives. Arresting elderly nobodies like Roger Stone in SWAT raids in the middle of the night, with CNN along to broadcast it worldwide. It seems vicious, but hey, we’re … Read more

Notable Quote – We’re Screwed

November 26, 2019 Skip

“A generation that doesn’t know history has no past; and no future.”-Robert Heinlein (science fiction writer, author, speaker, and “source for” part of the GraniteGrok name)

Notable Quote – Cluelessness of Bernie Sanders

November 23, 2019November 23, 2019 Skip

A special edition for Bruce Currie – our loyal opposition here at GraniteGrok and self-admitted Berni-Bro: “I’m disgusted by the idea that Michael Bloomberg or any other billionaire thinks they can circumvent the political process and spend tens of millions of dollars to buy our elections. It’s just the latest example of a rigged political … Read more

Notable Quote – Jordan Peterson

November 5, 2019 Skip

“Even more problematic is the insistence logically stemming from this presumption of social corruption that all individual problems, no matter how rare, must be solved by cultural restructuring, no matter how radical. Our society faces the increasing call to deconstruct its stabilizing traditions to include smaller and smaller numbers of people who do not or … Read more

Notable Quote – US Senator Daniel Moynihan

October 12, 2019 Skip

“The central conservative truth is that it is culture, not politics, that determines the success of a society. The central liberal truth is that politics can change culture and save it from itself.” -US Senator Daniel Moynihan I try to read all of the posts put up on GraniteGrok and two of the latest ones, … Read more

Notable Quote – James Buchanan on Socialism

October 5, 2019October 5, 2019 Skip

The socialist vision of politicized control-regulation of economic interaction has by no means been exorcised from the modern mind-set despite the evidence from reason or from history.

Notable Quote – George Will and Prof. Don Boudreaux

July 19, 2019 Skip

Modernity’s gift has been the ability and determination to sharply delineate private and public spheres, with the private being the zone of individual sovereignty. It is the realm of the household, the family, and the work that sustains both. This is the basis of the proposition that the Constitution of the first consciously modern nation, … Read more