“You have to have obedience; otherwise, the idea can spread that you don’t have to listen to the orders, and it can spread to important places.”

The United States is unusual among the industrial democracies in the rigidity of the system of ideological control – ‘indoctrination’, we might say – exercised through the mass media.

They come from acceptance of American values, not a rejection of them, and recognition that they’re rejected by the U.S. government and by U.S. elites, which does lead to hatred and anger.

Any dictator would admire the uniformity and obedience of the U.S. media.

There’s a tremendous gap between public opinion and public policy.

Every time there has been an effort by the Haitian people to overcome the misery and poverty that comes from 200 years of bitter attacks, really bitter, the U.S. steps in and blocks it.

If you don’t like what someone has to say, argue with them.

It’s a near miracle that nuclear war has so far been avoided.

The probability of apocalypse soon cannot be realistically estimated, but it is surely too high for any sane person to contemplate with equanimity.

Death and genitals are things that frighten people, and when people are frightened, they develop means of concealment and aggression. It is common sense.

The Federal Reserve has an official commitment to two different policies. One is to prevent inflation from getting too high. The second is to maintain high employment.

You cannot control your own population by force, but it can be distracted by consumption.

As soon as questions of will or decision or reason or choice of action arise, human science is at a loss.

But China, they’ve been there for 3,000 years and are paying no attention to the barbarians and don’t see any need to.

But I would not intend this to imply that in all imaginable circumstances one must, necessarily, act in accordance with this general responsibility.

Debt is a trap, especially student debt, which is enormous, far larger than credit card debt.

John Lewis Gaddis is not only the favorite historian of the Reagan administration, but he’s regarded as the dean of Cold War scholarship.

If we want a better original idea, we must generate our own before we screen others’ suggestions.

The urge to create a fictional narrative is a mysterious one, and when an idea comes, the writer’s sense of what a story wants to be is only vaguely visible through the penumbra of inspiration.

The one word you should forget when you start a new project is the word ‘I’ – you need to replace that word ‘I’ with the idea of ‘everybody else.

Making an idea into an emotion.

Both men have an authoritarian idea of government; democracy is merely a façade.

Merely that you start off with ideas buzzing around in your head, and then you try to give them the simpler, more graceful shape, of a feeling that a reader might share.

I did an album and they allowed me to sell it at the show. I also did a Disney cruise line gig.

The idea of 24-hour news, if you really step back, is pretty insane. Just even saying ’24-hour news’ almost has satire laced in it.