Tag: Quote

January 2018 – Quote of the Month

“There is no charm equal to tenderness of heart.” ~Jane Austen

December 2017 – Quote of the Month

“National boundaries are not evident when we view the Earth from space. Fanatical ethnic or religious or national chauvinisms are a little difficult to maintain when we see our planet as a fragile blue crescent fading to become an inconspicuous point of light against the bastion and citadel of the stars.” ~ Carl Sagan, Cosmos

November 2017 – Quote of the Month

“Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do.” ~ Voltaire

October 2017 – Quote of the Month

“Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind.” ~ Albert Einstein

September 2017 – Quote of the Month

“This is the sense of the desert hills, that there is room enough and time enough.” ~ Mary Hunter Austin

August 2017 – Quote of the Month

“I think some of the funniest and most artistic people I know are the ones who had a hard time at school. They often have humility and artistry. So, as much as I feel bad for kids who have to go through a rough childhood, I believe that if they can turn it around, it’s …

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Monumental Mistakes

The John Hunt Morgan statue on the lawn of the old Fayette Co. Courthouse on West Main Street in Lexington, Kentucky.

Since Dear Leader Trump’s recent comments regarding the Charlottesville demonstrations and related violence, I’ve seen many people on my social media channels offering a defense of the Confederate monuments. (Supplemented with bogus stories about the Confederate flag.) First, an overview of where I stand on some related matters: I’m heartfelt advocate of freedom of speech, and …

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July 2017 – Quote of the Month

“The crucial test of ethical values is whether they apply to strangers, and those afar, not just in our midst.” ~ Bernard Crick, Essays on Citizenship, 2000

June 2017 – Quote of the Month

“Broken by it, I, too, may be; bow to it I never will. The probability that we may fall in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just; it shall not deter me.” ~ Abraham Lincoln

May 2017 – Quote of the Month

“The very concept of objective truth is fading out of the world. Lies will pass into history.” ~ George Orwell

April 2017 – Quote of the Month

“Belief can be manipulated. Only knowledge is dangerous.” ~ Frank Herbert

March 2017 – Quote of the Month

“Besides, as the vilest Writer has his Readers, so the greatest Liar has his Believers; and it often happens, that if a Lie be believ’d only for an Hour, it has done its Work, and there is no farther occasion for it. Falsehood flies, and the Truth comes limping after it; so that when Men …

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February 2017 – Quote of the Month

“A good deal of tyranny goes by the name of protection.” ~ Crystal Eastman

January 2017 – Quote of the Month

“I wish it need not have happened in my time,’ said Frodo. ‘So do I,’ said Gandalf, ‘and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.’” ~ The Shadow of …

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Mourning in America

Inverted American Flag - Sign of Distress

“A fascist is one whose lust for money or power is combined with such an intensity of intolerance toward those of other races, parties, classes, religions, cultures, regions or nations as to make him ruthless in his use of deceit or violence to attain his ends.” ~ Henry A. Wallace

December 2016 – Quote of the Month

“The split in America, rather than simply economic, is between those who embrace reason, who function in the real world of cause and effect, and those who, numbed by isolation and despair, now seek meaning in a mythical world of intuition, a world that is no longer reality-based, a world of magic.” ~ Chris Hedges

November 2016 – Quote of the Month

“Whether we and our politicians know it or not, Nature is party to all our deals and decisions, and she has more votes, a longer memory, and a sterner sense of justice than we do.” ~ Wendell Berry

October 2016 – Quote of the Month

“The trouble is that we have a bad habit, encouraged by pedants and sophisticates, of considering happiness as something rather stupid. Only pain is intellectual, only evil interesting. This is the treason of the artist; a refusal to admit the banality of evil and the terrible boredom of pain.” ~ Ursula K. Le Guin, The …

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September 2016 – Quote of the Month

“Compassion, in which all ethics must take root, can only attain its full breadth and depth if it embraces all living creatures and does not limit itself to mankind.” ~ Albert Schweitzer

August 2016 – Quote of the Month

“The very concept of objective truth is fading out of the world. Lies will pass into history.” ~George Orwell

The Dreamers of Dreams

Willy Wonka and the Oompa Loompas

I really know next to nothing about the man Gene Wilder who died today at the age of 83.   We are the music makers… and we are the dreamers of dreams. ~ Willy Wonka But I do know that he left an indelible glowing and warm memory in my childhood: that of Willy Wonka …

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July 2016 – Quote of the Month

“My attitude to peace is rather based on the Burmese definition of peace – it really means removing all the negative factors that destroy peace in this world. So peace does not mean just putting an end to violence or to war, but to all other factors that threaten peace, such as discrimination, such as …

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June 2016 – Quote of the Month

“While we are under the tyranny of Priests, it will ever be their interest, to invalidate the law of nature and reason, in order to establish systems incompatible therewith.” ~Ethan Allen

Warning: Outdoors May Contain Nature

Disney World Caution Sign Alligators, Bees, Bacteria, Heart Disease, Pollen, Sunstroke, Etc.

Personal Tragedy or National News Fodder On June 14th, 2016, tragedy struck a Nebraska family when their two year old son was attacked and killed by an alligator at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort and Spa. Five days later and this event is still making national headline news. As unadulteratedly heartbreaking as this is for the child’s family; as much …

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May 2016 – Quote of the Month

“The secret of getting ahead is getting started.” ~Mark Twain

April 2016 – Quote of the Month

“As soon as men decide that all means are permitted to fight an evil, then their good becomes indistinguishable from the evil that they set out to destroy.” ~Christopher Dawson

Trumped Trump

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump gestures and declares "You're fired!" at a rally in Manchester, New Hampshire, June 17, 2015. REUTERS/Dominick Reuter

Donald Trump could almost qualify as a cartoon character, except for the dark rancor that spews from his round, orange mouth. What at first might have seemed like an extension of one of his reality TV shows has long crossed the border into scary fascism. Here is why I think the man is a danger …

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March 2016 – Quote of the Month

“Go in peace! I will not say: do not weep; for not all tears are an evil.” ~J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King

February 2016 – Quote of the Month

“Success is a little like wrestling a gorilla. You don’t quit when you’re tired. You quit when the gorilla is tired.” ~Robert Strauss

January 2016 – Quote of the Month

“We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and think it is forever.” ~Carl Sagan, Cosmos

December 2015 – Quote of the Month

“The most formidable weapon against errors of every kind is reason.” ~Thomas Paine

November 2015 – Quote of the Month

“The gladdest moment in human life, me thinks, is a departure into unknown lands.” ~Sir Richard Burton

October 2015 – Quote of the Month

“Now everyone dreams of a love lasting and true But you and I know what this world can do So let’s make our steps clear that the other may see And I’ll wait for you If I should fall behind Wait for me” ~Bruce Springsteen

September 2015 – Quote of the Month

“I don’t think the American Dream was that everyone was going to make it or that everyone was going to make a billion dollars, but it was that everyone was going to have an opportunity and the chance to live a life with some decency and a chance for some self-respect.” ~Bruce Springsteen (as captured …

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An Absolute Monarchy in the Minds of Men

In his congressional office, Rep. Bob Brady, D-Pa., drinks from the glass of water Pope Francis used during his speech to Congress. Stan White/U.S. Rep. Bob Brady's office via AP

For all of the humanistic conventions and relative progressiveness of Pope Francis*, that is enchanting the people; here, at the bedrock is what continues to disturb me: the fostering of supernatural, magical beliefs. If the disservice and damage that this magical mindset does among the everyday individual is disturbing enough, it is downright scary when …

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August 2015 – Quote of the Month

The best way to destroy an enemy is to make him a friend. ~ Abraham Lincoln

July 2015 – Quote of the Month

The world is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper. ~ Bertrand Russell

June 2015 – Quote of the Month

Reality has a well-known liberal bias. ~Stephen Colbert

May 2015 – Quote of the Month

Long stormy spring-time, wet contentious April, winter chilling the lap of very May, but at length the season of summer does come. ~Thomas Carlyle

April 2015 – Quote of the Month

It is a curious thought, but it is only when you see people looking ridiculous that you realize just how much you love them. ~Agatha Christie

March 2015 – Quote of the Month

No winter lasts forever; no spring skips its turn. ~ Hal Borland

February 2015 – Quote of the Month

Of winter’s lifeless world each tree Now seems a perfect part; Yet each one holds summer’s secret Deep down within its heart. ~ Charles G. Slater

January 2015 – Quote of the Month

Man is the only kind of varmint sets his own trap, baits it, then steps in it. ~ John Steinbeck, Sweet Thursday

December 2014 – Quote of the Month

For disappearing acts, it’s hard to beat what happens to the eight hours supposedly left after eight of sleep and eight of work. ~Doug Larson

November 2014 – Quote of the Month

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its …

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The Nightmare Before Christmas

Shelob

Whereas others have decorated their house for the winter holidays – namely, christmas, we’ve kept the arachnid Halloween decorations up in our entryway – Cirith Ungol (Sindarin for Spider’s Cleft, or Pass of the Spider). All Photos by Yours Truly – Glen Green. Click on images to see larger versions. In a ravine she lived, …

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October 2014 – Quote of the Month

There is a child in every one of us who is still a trick-or-treater looking for a brightly-lit front porch. ~Robert Brault

September 2014 – Quote of the Month

Remember your humanity, and forget the rest. ~ Bertrand Russell

August 2014 – Quote of the Month

It’s a most distressing affliction to have a sentimental heart and a skeptical mind. ~ Naguib Mahfouz

July 2014 – Quote of the Month

Always do what you are afraid to do. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

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