Montesquieu: The laws of Rome had wisely divided public power among a large number of magistracies, which supported, checked and tempered each other. Since they all had only limited power, every citizen was qualified for them, and the people — seeing many persons pass before them one after the other — did not grow accustomed to any in particular. But in these times the system of the republic changed. Through the people the most powerful men gave themselves extraordinary commissions — which destroyed the authority of the people and magistrates, and placed all great matters in the hands of one man, or a few. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3232
Jon Lee Anderson: I have yet to find a single credible source pointing to a case where Che executed 'an innocent'. Those persons executed by Guevara or on his orders were condemned for the usual crimes punishable by death at times of war or in its aftermath: desertion, treason or crimes such as rape, torture or murder. I should add that my research spanned five years, and included anti-Castro Cubans among the Cuban-American exile community in Miami and elsewhere. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3239
Arthur Rosenberg: It is precisely the biggest and most powerful capitalists, the owners of giant monopolistic enterprises and of the fijinancial institutions linked to them who were the fijirst to abandon the hackneyed soil of liberalism and turn to the new imperialist methods. The vast majority of middling and small capitalists remained faithful to the liberal tradition for much longer. To capture state-power, the capitalists opposed to liberalism are compelled to enlist allies in other sectors of the population. The most astute leaders of the new imperialism manage to outdo even the liberals and the bourgeois democrats in their demagogy. Sometimes, under the slogan of national defence of the poor, they even fijight the ‘narrow-minded monied interests’ of liberalism. There is scarcely any doubt that modern fascism belongs with this type, and that it has developed the nationalist propaganda characteristic of this kind of politics to perfection. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3240
Karl Marx: Mankind thus inevitably sets itself only such tasks as it is able to solve, since closer examination will always show that the problem itself arises only when the material conditions for its solution are already present or at least in the course of formation. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3241
Karl Marx: To clamour for equal or even equitable retribution on the basis of the wages system is the same as to clamour for freedom on the basis of the slavery system. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3242
Lenin: That the bourgeoisie hate us so passionately is one of the most striking proofs that we are showing the people the right ways and means of overthrowing the rule of the bourgeoisie. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3243
Lenin: We must not only “terrorise” the capitalists, i.e., make them feel the omnipotence of the proletarian state and give up all idea of actively resisting it. We must also break passive resistance, which is undoubtedly more dangerous and harmful. We must not only break resistance of every kind. We must also compel the capitalists to work within the framework of the new state organisation. It is not enough to “remove” the capitalists; we must (after removing the undesirable and incorrigible “resisters”) employ them in the service of the new state. This applies both to the capitalists and to the upper section of the bourgeois intellectuals, office employees, etc. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3244
Leila Khaled: In the beginning, all women had to prove that we could be equal to men in armed struggle. So we wanted to be like men -- even in our appearance… I no longer think it’s necessary to prove ourselves as women by imitating men. I have learned that a woman can be a fighter, a freedom fighter, a political activist, and that she can fall in love, and be loved, she can be married, have children, be a mother… Revolution must mean life also; every aspect of life. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3245
James Connolly: They lower our wages—to prevent improvidence; they increase our rents—to prevent improvidence; they periodically suspend us from our employment—to prevent improvidence, and as soon as we are worn out in their service they send us to a semi-convict establishment, known as the workhouse, where we are scientifically starved to death—to prevent improvidence. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3246
Amilcar Cabral: A basic principle of our struggle is our counting on our own forces, our own sacrifices, our own efforts, but considering the characteristic underdevelopment of our people, of our country, the economic backwardness of our country, it is very difficult for us to produce weapons. Taking into account these circumstances, taking into account the fact that in our country 99% of the people are illiterate, which makes the immediate existence of cadres difficult; and also taking into account that the enemy, which has no scruples, is aided by its NATO allies, in particular, the United States, Federal Germany, and some other countries, and above all by its South African racist allies-taking into account all this and also the essential characteristic of our times, which is the general struggle of the peoples against imperialism and the existence of a socialist camp, which is the greatest bulwark against imperialism, we accept and request aid from all the peoples that can give it to us. We do not ask for aid in manpower: there are enough of us to fight and defeat colonialism in our country. We ask for aid in weapons, in articles of prime necessity to supply our liberated regions, in medicines to heal our wounded and cure our sick and to provide medical care for the population of the liberated regions. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3247
Mao Zedong: When I say the United States is evil, I mean its ruling class. The American people are pretty good. Many of them haven't awakened yet, but they will. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3248
Lenin: Communists who have no illusions, who do not give way to despondency, and who preserve their strength and flexibility ‘to begin from the beginning’ over and over again in approaching an extremely dificult task, are not doomed (and in all probability will not perish). https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3250
Harpal Brar: Fascism is the violent attempt of decaying capitalism to defeat the proletarian revolution and forcibly retard its own demise. Fascism uses demagogy as a science for it dare not declare its aims openly, for it could build no mass support on the basis of its real aims. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3252
Kenneth Neill Cameron: If Stalin had accomplished for the world bourgeoisie what he did for the world proletariat, he would have long been hailed in bourgeois circles as one of the “greats” of all time, not only of the present century. The same general criteria should apply to Stalin’s reputation from the Marxist point of view. Stalin advanced the position of the world proletariat further than any person in history with the exception of Lenin. True, without the base Lenin laid, Stalin could not have built, but using this base he moved about as far as was possible in the existing situation. In short a new class of world leader has emerged, and Stalin is in its highest rank. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3254
Leila Khaled: I do not see how my oppressor could sit in judgment on my response to his oppressive actions against me. He is in no position to render an impartial judgment or to accuse me of air piracy and hijacking when he has hijacked my home and hijacked me and my people out of our land. If the enemy defines morality and legality in his own terms and decides to apply his ethical and legal doctrines against me because he has the power as well as the means of communications to justify his inhumanity, I am under no moral obligation to listen, let alone obey his dictates. Indeed, I am under a moral obligation to resist and to fight to death the enemy's moral corruption. My deed cannot be evaluated without examining the underlying causes. The revolutionary deed I carried out on August 29, 1969 was an assertion of my spurned humanity, a declaration of the humanity of Palestinians. It was an act of protest against the West for its pro-Zionist (therefore anti-Palestinian) posture. The list of the sins of the West is overwhelming. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3255
John Steinbeck: Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3256
Ronald Wright: In times of war or crisis, power is easily stolen from the many by the few on a promise of security. The more elusive the or imaginary the foe, the better for manufacturing consent. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3260
Friedrich Engels: The demand for equality in the mouth of the proletariat has therefore a double meaning. It is either — as was the case especially at the very start, for example in the Peasant War (see Engels’ work Peasant War in Germany)— the spontaneous reaction against the crying social inequalities, against the contrast between rich and poor, the feudal lords and their serfs, the surfeiters and the starving; as such it is simply an expression of the revolutionary instinct, and finds its justification in that, and in that only. Or, on the other hand, this demand has arisen as a reaction against the bourgeois demand for equality, drawing more or less correct and more far-reaching demands from this bourgeois demand, and serving as an agitational means in order to stir up the workers against the capitalists with the aid of the capitalists’ own assertions; and in this case it stands or falls with bourgeois equality itself. In both cases the real content of the proletarian demand for equality is the demand for the abolition of classes. Any demand for equality which goes beyond that, of necessity passes into absurdity. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3262
Fernando Pessoa: The value of things is not in the time they last, but in the intensity with which they occur. That’s why there are unforgettable moments, unexplained things and incomparable people. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote3263
