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An open-ended selection of some good quotes, by the famous or otherwise.
"The quickest way to end a war is to lose it" - George Orwell
"War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself." - John Stewart Mill
"I have this theory about politics: when a political party offers the voters ham and eggs, and the voters say no thanks, its first instinct is to say, 'OK then – how about double ham and double eggs?'" - David Frum
"It is a general popular error to suppose the loudest complainers for the public to be the most anxious for its welfare." - Edmund Burke
"Great deeds are usually wrought at great risks." - Herodotus
"The idea of a news broadcast once was to find someone with information and broadcast it. The idea now is to find someone with ignorance and spread it around." - PJ O'Rourke
"I'll stop questioning the patriotism of those who oppose the war when Democrats stop questioning the humanity of those who oppose welfare, affirmative action, and gun control." Steve on Tacitus
"This is a massive and difficult undertaking -- it is worth our effort, it is worth our sacrifice, because we know the stakes. The failure of Iraqi democracy would embolden terrorists around the world, increase dangers to the American people, and extinguish the hopes of millions in the region. Iraqi democracy will succeed -- and that success will send forth the news, from Damascus to Teheran -- that freedom can be the future of every nation. The establishment of a free Iraq at the heart of the Middle East will be a watershed event in the global democratic revolution.
Sixty years of Western nations excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe -- because in the long run, stability cannot be purchased at the expense of liberty. As long as the Middle East remains a place where freedom does not flourish, it will remain a place of stagnation, resentment, and violence ready for export. And with the spread of weapons that can bring catastrophic harm to our country and to our friends, it would be reckless to accept the status quo." - President George W. Bush
