Start doing the things you think should be done, and start being what you think society should become.
ADAM MICHNIKAfter the French Revolution, it was not the treason of the king that was in question; it was the existence of the king. You have to be very careful when you judge and execute somebody for being a symbol.
More Adam Michnik Quotes
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I think it’s always dangerous to make political arguments in a religiously ideological way. And it’s very dangerous to treat as traitors to the American nation those who think differently.
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Both men have an authoritarian idea of government; democracy is merely a façade.
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I think you can be an enemy of Saddam Hussein even if Donald Rumsfeld is also an enemy of Saddam Hussein.
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This is why we will never again say that Chamberlain is no better than Hitler, Roosevelt no better than Stalin, and Nixon no better than Mao Zedong, even if we do condemn Roosevelt for Yalta, Chamberlain for Munich, and Nixon for Watergate.
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As a rule, dictatorships guarantee safe streets and terror of the doorbell. In democracy the streets may be unsafe after dark, but the most likely visitor in the early hours will be the milkman.
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They want a gradual coup. If Orbán stayed in power in Hungary or if Kaczynski were to win an election in our country, it would be dangerous.
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We still have politicians who strive for a different type of country: Kaczynski as well as Orbán in Hungary.
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Although there is a strong desire for freedom in the countries of Eastern Europe, there is no democratic tradition, so that the risk of anarchy and chaos continues to exist.
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I believe that a man can only be useful to his country when he can look at it clearly.
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The main difference between the Prague Spring and the Velvet Revolution was that the former was mostly the work of Communist party members and others who wanted to bring about ‘socialism with a human face.’
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We lack a political culture, a culture of compromise. We in Poland, as well as the Hungarians, have never learned this sort of thing.
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France can never accept that it is no longer a dominating power in the world of culture. This is true both of the French right and the French left. They keep thinking that Americans are primitive cowboys or farmers who do not understand anything.
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The real struggle for us is for the citizen to cease to be the property of the state.
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After the fall of communism in Poland, we had a post-communist as president for two terms: Aleksander Kwasniewski. He was very good. He brought Poland into NATO and the European Union.
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Today we reject the notion of equality between a regime that belongs to the democratic world – even if it is conservative and disagreeable – and a totalitarian dictatorship, whether its colors are black, red, or green.
ADAM MICHNIK