The genius of our ruling class is that it has kept a majority of the people from ever questioning the inequity of a system where most people drudge along, paying heavy taxes for which they get nothing in return.
GORE VIDALAll in all, I would not have missed this century for the world.
More Gore Vidal Quotes
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I cannot remember when I was not fascinated by Henry Adams.
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Sex is. There is nothing more to be done about it. Sex builds no roads, writes no novels and sex certainly gives no meaning to anything in life but itself.
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Obama just came swiftly out of nowhere, which was a relief to those of us who care about the Republic, and at first he seemed a very good thing.
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Between fourteen and nineteen, I must have begun and abandoned six novels.
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It’s odd to meet a rather elderly man who says, ‘I’ve been reading you all my life.’ It makes you feel a slight chill.
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Democracy is supposed to give you the feeling of choice, like Painkiller X and Painkiller Y. But they’re both just aspirin.
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Each youth betrays considerable anxiety about the wedding night ahead.
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The only thing that I react really violently to is being misquoted.
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As societies grow decadent, the language grows decadent, too. Words are used to disguise, not to illuminate, action: you liberate a city by destroying it. Words are to confuse, so that at election time people will solemnly vote against their own interests.
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The American high school graduate is two years behind his English, French or German counterpart; in Alabama, God knows how far behind.
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In essence, Clinton’s Anti-Terrorism Act would set up a national police force, over the long-dead bodies of the founders.
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You hear all this whining going on, ‘Where are our great writers?’ The thing I might feel doleful about is: Where are the readers?
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It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail.
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At any given moment, public opinion is a chaos of superstition, misinformation and prejudice.
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I was like everyone else when Obama was elected – optimistic.
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