Quote of the Day: 30 September 2024 #QotD

“Have you any idea how much tyrants fear the people they oppress? All of them realize that, one day, amongst their many victims, there is sure to be one who rises against them and strikes back!” -Albus Dumbledore, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
[For some reason this doesn't stop them from oppressing people in the first place. Tyrants gunna tyrant, I guess.]

Quote of the Day: 29 September 2024 #QotD

“The gospel is not a way to avoid challenges and problems but a solution to increase our faith and learn how to deal with them.” -Massimo De Feo

Quote of the Day: 28 September 2024 #QotD

“The less respect an older person deserves the more certain he is to demand it from anyone younger.” -Clifford “Kip” Russell, Have Space Suit – Will Travel
[I've run into this a few times myself. Hopefully I am not, and will not be, guilty of doing this to others myself.]

Quote of the Day: 27 September 2024 #QotD

“The past happened because a hundred little random things had to fall exactly into place in exactly the right way, in exactly the proper sequence, and while it was easy to accept the good results, one could only rage at the bad ones.” -Tom Clancy
[That is, at least, how it appears to us. Who knows what has actually transpired, and whether those events were truly random. In any event, we can only accept those things that have happened to us, and seek agency over those events that we can control.]

Quote of the Day: 26 September 2024 #QotD

“[A]nything worth dying for is certainly worth living for.” -The old man, Catch-22
[While there were many things I didn't care for from this book, and this character in particular, this sentiment is worthy of repetition.]

Quote of the Day: 25 September 2024 #QotD

“How cruel it is to be forced to play.” -Hobbes, Calvin and Hobbes
[Would that I were forced to play sometimes. It would be a convenient excuse.]

Quote of the Day: 24 September 2024 #QotD

“Scientists are actually preoccupied with accomplishment. So they are focused on whether they can do something. They never stop to ask if they should do something.” -Ian Malcolm, Jurassic Park
[Many of them also get caught up in telling you how you should live your life. But, you're the expert on what will make your life worth living. So, stand up for your preferences.]

Quote of the Day: 23 September 2024 #QotD

“There is much evil in the world.” -M. Bouc, Murder on the Orient Express
[This is something that remains true, regardless of how we would like to things to be. We need to act with this in mind to be able to account for how things are likely to proceed.]

Quote of the Day: 22 September 2024 #QotD

“Our Father wants a deeper relationship with all His sons and daughters, but it is our choice.” -J. Anette Dennis

Quote of the Day: 21 September 2024 #QotD

“There was no point in making it easy for people. Life wasn’t easy[.]” -Granny Weatherwax (attributed), Wintersmith
[Never mind that we all want it to be.]

Quote of the Day: 20 September 2024 #QotD

“Now I care far more how humanity lives than how long. Progress, for me, means increasing goodness and happiness of individual lives. For the species, as for each man, mere longevity seems to me a contemptible ideal.” -C. S. Lewis
[It seems a reasonable position to take to me. I'm certainly not hastening anyone's end. But I won't seek to prolong it if doing so will provide only misery or suffering.]

Quote of the Day: 19 September 2024 #QotD

“[I]t seems to me better to follow the real truth of things than an imaginary view of them.” -Niccolo Machiavelli
[Some people find it better to follow the imaginary view. I can understand how they may decide that it's simply easier to acquiesce rather than stand firm and insist on the truth. But there will be no good outcomes from following that approach.]

Quote of the Day: 18 September 2024 #QotD

“[T]he essential point in running a risk is that the returns justify it.” -Sennett Forell, Foundation and Empire
[At least if you want to survive over the long run. You could just get lucky though. Some people do.]

Quote of the Day: 17 September 2024 #QotD

“[I]t is the Opinion of this Convention, that it [the constitution] should afterwards be submitted to a Convention of Delegates, chosen in each State by the People thereof, under the Recommendation of its Legislature, for their Assent and Ratification; and that each Convention assenting to, and ratifying the Same, should give Notice thereof to the United States in Congress assembled.” -Federal Convention
[Happy Constitution Day!]

Quote of the Day: 16 September 2024 #QotD

“Point is, we can make fun of you because we like you. That’s how it works. Anybody else does it, and we ram a dueling cane up a part of them that I can’t mention, ’cuz I’m working on my language.” -Wayne Ferrisborn, The Lost Metal
[Teasing is weird. It can make you feel loved or hurt you because of who is doing it. It's just plain odd.]

Quote of the Day: 15 September 2024 #QotD

“One last aspect of being valiant in the testimony of Jesus that I will mention is our individual pursuit of personal holiness. Jesus is our essential Redeemer, and He pleads, ‘Repent, all ye ends of the earth, and come unto me and be baptized in my name, that ye may be sanctified by the reception of the Holy Ghost, that ye may stand spotless before me at the last day.’” -D. Todd Christofferson

Quote of the Day: 14 September 2024 #QotD

“Neither social justice advocates nor anyone else can safely proceed on the assumption that the particular laws and policies they prefer will automatically have the results they expect, without taking into account how the people on whom these laws and policies are imposed will react.” -Thomas Sowell
[Second order effects and the law of unintended consequences always rear their ugly heads. Things are going to happen that you either don't want to happen, or didn't think would happen.]

Quote of the Day: 13 September 2024 #QotD

“When it comes to politics, liberty — and the systems and beliefs that support it — is the whole point.” -Andrew Klavan
[So, speak, act, and vote accordingly.]

Quote of the Day: 12 September 2024 #QotD

“When did we all lose our minds?” -Goat, Pearls Before Swine
[A good question without a good answer.]

Quote of the Day: 11 September 2024 #QotD

“I may remark in passing that when people say that government rests on force they give an admirable instance of the foggy and muddled cynicism of modernity. Government does not rest on force. Government is force; it rests on consent or a conception of justice.” -G. K. Chesterton
[Certainly, not all force is governmental. But, inherent in the authority to enact law is the authority to administer punishment for violations. If those punishments are capricious and arbitrary rather than even-handed and impartial rebellion is imminent.]

Quote of the Day: 10 September 2024 #QotD

“Your choices shape your world.” -Michael Carpenter, Skin Game
[This should be evident. However, given the state of things, I'm not sure people are generally bright enough to recognize it.]

Quote of the Day: 9 September 2024 #QotD

“Those who were incapable of defending themselves were often frightened of those who fought on their behalf.” -Kanemori (thought), Musings of a Hermit
[So, it's wise for those of us who go armed to be prepared for a situation where someone that has been thus protected turns on his protector or denounces him in some way. Certainly, don't expect appreciation and gratitude.]

Quote of the Day: 8 September 2024 #QotD

“Our loving Father oversaw the Creation of this very earth for the express purpose of providing an opportunity for you and for me to have the stretching and refining experiences of mortality, the chance to use our God-given moral agency to choose Him, to learn and grow, to make mistakes, to repent, to love God and our neighbour, and to one day return home to Him.” -Patrick Kearon

Quote of the Day: 7 September 2024 #QotD

“Decent people are so easy to manipulate[.]” -Barty Crouch, Jr., Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
[It's probably worth thinking about whether someone is trying to manipulate you, or in what way they are trying to do so. Because otherwise you are likely to fall for a lot more of it than if you don't.]

Quote of the Day: 6 September 2024 #QotD

“Of course, the Marxian definition of value is ridiculous. All the work one cares to add will not turn a mud pie into an apple tart; it remains a mud pie, value zero. By corollary, unskillful work can easily subtract value; an untalented cook can turn wholesome dough and fresh green apples, valuable already, into an inedible mess, value zero. Conversely, a great chef can fashion of those same materials a confection of greater value than a commonplace apple tart, with no more effort than an ordinary cook uses to prepare an ordinary sweet.

“These kitchen illustrations demolish the Marxian theory of value—the fallacy from which the entire magnificent fraud of communism derives—and illustrate the truth of the common-sense definition as measured in terms of use.” -Lt.-Col. Jean V. Dubois, Starship Troopers

[But don't expect any Marxist to admit it. They are allergic to truth and reality.]

Quote of the Day: 5 September 2024 #QotD

 

“If the shortest distance to any man’s heart is his stomach, then one of the better compliments a man can give a woman is to ask for seconds.” -Tom Clancy

[Or to anyone, really. But then we tend to associate the heart with romantic love.]

Quote of the Day: 4 September 2024 #QotD

“Ohlmeyer saw communism for the sham that it was—a bunch of brutes who seized power in the name of the people, only to repress the very people they claimed to champion.” -Vince Flynn
[There are an awful lot of people who want to accept communists claims, rather than looking at documented history and track records of communist practices.]

Quote of the Day: 3 September 2024 #QotD

“It’s only work if somebody makes you do it.” -Calvin, Calvin and Hobbes
[Sadly, this also applies to things you make yourself do. Darn it.]

Quote of the Day: 2 September 2024 #QotD

“You know, there is such a thing as accurate and inaccurate. Irrespective of whatever your feelings are.” -Ian Malcolm, The Lost World
[How to deal with postmodernists as taught by a novel from the previous century.]

Quote of the Day: 1 September 2024 #QotD

“Coming to trust in God’s divine purposes breathes hope into weary souls and kindles determination in seasons of anguish and heartache.” -Brian K. Taylor