“If you want to achieve something, you build the basis for it.”

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 workers are more insecure, that’s very ‘healthy’ for the society, because if workers are insecure, they won’t ask for wages, they won’t go on strike, they won’t call for benefits; they’ll serve the masters gladly and passively. And that’s optimal for corporations’ economic health.

In the academic world, most of the work that is done is clerical. A lot of the work done by professors is routine.

The internet could be a very positive step towards education, organisation and participation in a meaningful society.