Quotes of the day

Via the Patriot Post.

CULTURE

"Most of our nation's great problems, including our economic problems, have as their root decaying moral values. Whether we have the stomach to own up to it or not, we have become an immoral people left with little more than the pretense of morality. ... Do you believe that it is moral and just for one person to be forcibly used to serve the purposes of another? And, if that person does not peaceably submit to being so used, do you believe that there should be the initiation of some kind of force against him? Neither question is complex and can be answered by either a yes or no. For me the answer is no to both questions but I bet that your average college professor, politician or minister would not give a simple yes or no response. They would be evasive and probably say that it all depends. ...[That] is because they are sly enough to know that either answer would be troublesome for their agenda. A yes answer would put them firmly in the position of supporting some of mankind's most horrible injustices such as slavery. After all, what is slavery but the forcible use of one person to serve the purposes of another? A no answer would put them on the spot as well because that would mean they would have to come out against taking the earnings of one American to give to another in the forms of farm and business handouts, Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps and thousands of similar programs that account for more than two-thirds of the federal budget. There is neither moral justification nor constitutional authority for what amounts to legalized theft. This is not an argument against paying taxes. We all have a moral obligation to pay our share of the constitutionally mandated and enumerated functions of the federal government. ...[But] now that the U.S. Congress has established the principle that one American has a right to live at the expense of another American, it no longer pays to be moral." --George Mason University economics professor Walter E. Williams
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RE: THE LEFT

"These decisions -- that government, not the free market, shall dictate who runs a private corporation, what that corporation shall make or sell, and what it shall pay its employees -- are unprecedented in an America not fully mobilized for war. Apologists for the Obama administration -- and there are many -- note that previous administrations have done similar things in 'difficult economic times.' As examples, they cite Franklin Delano Roosevelt's Depression-era agricultural production limits to boost farm prices and Richard Nixon's "temporary" wage and price freeze to cut inflation. What today's cheerleaders for Draconian interference in capitalism and our private lives fail to mention is that these measures were abandoned because they did not work. FDR's farm production limits produced a thriving black market and eventually succumbed to the need to feed millions of our countrymen suddenly drafted to fight World War II. President Nixon's attempt to dampen inflation with wage and price controls was a monumental failure. When he started the program, the inflation rate was nearly 4 percent. By the time he left office, it was more than 13 percent and climbing. But those ugly precedents aren't going to stop the O-Team from trying again." --columnist Oliver North
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THE LAST WORD

"Apparently, it's OK for Obama to fire the head of General Motors, but Bush can't fire his own U.S. attorneys. It is generally agreed that the Obama administration's demand that Rick Wagoner resign as chairman of General Motors is the price of GM's accepting government money. To promote the sales of GM vehicles, Obama says the government will stand by your GM car warranty. And all the taxpayers will get a lube job. The new GM owner's manual will come with a disclaimer: 'Close enough for government work.' ... Now that the government owns everything, there's no end to the dead wood that can be cleared out. Except the problem is ... most of the dead wood exists only because of the government in the first place. Capitalism has its own methods of clearing out dead wood, which the government keeps preventing by forcing the taxpayer to bail out capitalism's losers." --columnist Ann Coulter

An auspicious start to the season

In their season opener, the Mariners defeated the Minnesota Twins in the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome by a score of 6 to 1. The victory was sweetened further as Ken Griffey Jr. inaugurated his second stint with the Mariners by hitting a solo home run, the eighth time in his career he's done so in the season's first game.  As with just about anything in baseball, a record of this feat is kept which he has now matched.