If there is no God, why bother to tell the truth? Why not steal?
BEN STEINPut simply, the rich pay a lot of taxes as a total percentage of taxes collected, but they don’t pay a lot of taxes as a percentage of what they can afford to pay, or as a percentage of what the government needs to close the deficit gap.
More Ben Stein Quotes
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When I seemed to be irritable or sad, my father would quote the learned Dr. Knight, and then say, ‘Just go to sleep.’ Like all smart aleck kids, I thought the advice was silly. But as I’ve grown older, I’ve realized just how smart Knight was.
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I would say, based on the little I know, Darwinism explains microevolution within species quite well. As to its broader consequence and implications, I don’t think it explains individual species evolution at all well.
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I agree that there are some bad apples on Wall Street. I spent about ten years exposing corporate and financial fraud for ‘Barron’s’ magazine and I found a lot to write about.
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The real stars are wearing body armor in 130-degree heat . . . They’re getting shot at and they don’t have any stunt doubles standing in for them.
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Americans are terrified because so many of them have been laid off in recent years and months and they fear that they may be next. Even if they have not been laid off or have not known anyone laid off, they definitely know someone who has lost his home.
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Darwinism doesn’t explain where gravity comes from. It doesn’t explain where thermodynamics comes from. It doesn’t explain where the laws of physics come from. It doesn’t explain where matter comes from.
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Humans are alive, therefore life must be complex.
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Keep on beginning and failing. Each time you fail, start all over gain, and you will grow stronger until have accomplished a purpose – not the one you began with perhaps, but one you’ll be glad to remember.
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I feel as if I’m in on a pass and am damn lucky to have whatever I have. It could all be taken away in a second.
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It’s a lot better to hope than not to.
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If we try to engineer outcomes, if we overturn tradition to make everyone the same, we ruin society. If we upset tradition to allow for an equal shot at the starting gate, everyone wins, except for the charlatans and would be dictators.
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The ordinary American – as far as I can tell – knows so much less than he did fifty years ago and has such poor work habits compared with fifty years ago that the average multiplicand of knowledge/capabilities is a much smaller number than it was in 1961.
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I came to realize that life lived to help others is the only one that matters and that it sis my duty … This is my highest and best use as a human.
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The first step in getting what you want from life-decide what you want.
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I’m an economist by training. I don’t really work as an economist. I only worked briefly as an economist.
BEN STEIN