Lenin: (T)he essence of proletarian dictatorship is not in force alone, or even mainly in force. Its chief feature is the organisation and discipline of the advanced contingent of the working people, of their vanguard; of their sole leader, the proletariat, whose object is to build socialism, abolish the division of society into classes, make all members of society working people, and remove the basis for all exploitation of man by man. This object cannot be achieved at one stroke. It requires a fairly long period of transition from capitalism to socialism, because the reorganisation of production is a difficult matter, because radical changes in all spheres of life need time, and because the enormous force of habit of running things in a petty-bourgeois and bourgeois way can only be overcome by a long and stubborn struggle. That is why Marx spoke of an entire period of the dictatorship of the proletariat as the period of transition from capitalism to socialism. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5859
Karl Marx: But, the transformation — either into joint-stock companies and trusts, or into State-ownership — does not do away with the capitalistic nature of the productive forces. In the joint-stock companies and trusts, this is obvious. And the modern State, again, is only the organization that bourgeois society takes on in order to support the external conditions of the capitalist mode of production against the encroachments as well of the workers as of individual capitalists. The modern state, no matter what its form, is essentially a capitalist machine — the state of the capitalists, the ideal personification of the total national capital. The more it proceeds to the taking over of productive forces, the more does it actually become the national capitalist, the more citizens does it exploit. The workers remain wage-workers — proletarians. The capitalist relation is not done away with. It is, rather, brought to a head. But, brought to a head, it topples over. State-ownership of the productive forces is not the solution of the conflict, but concealed within it are the technical conditions that form the elements of that solution. This solution can only consist in the practical recognition of the social nature of the modern forces of production, and therefore in the harmonizing with the socialized character of the means of production. And this can only come about by society openly and directly taking possession of the productive forces which have outgrown all control, except that of society as a whole. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5860
Cesare Beccaria: The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes…. Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5861
Karl Marx: We see then, that, apart from extremely elastic bounds, the nature of the exchange of commodities itself imposes no limit to the working-day, no limit to surplus-labour. The capitalist maintains his rights as a purchaser when he tries to make the working-day as long as possible, and to make, whenever possible, two working-days out of one. On the other hand, the peculiar nature of the commodity sold implies a limit to its consumption by the purchaser, and the labourer maintains his right as seller when he wishes to reduce the working-day to one of definite normal duration. There is here, therefore, an antinomy, right against right, both equally bearing the seal of the law of exchanges. Between equal rights force decides. Hence is it that in the history of capitalist production, the determination of what is a working-day, presents itself as the result of a struggle, a struggle between collective capital, i.e., the class of capitalists, and collective labour, i.e., the working-class. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5862
Friedrich Engels: It is to the capitalist's interest to make the working day as long as possible. The longer it is, the more surplus value it produces. The worker correctly feels that every hour of labour which he performs over and above the replacement of the wage is unjustly taken from him; he learns from bitter personal experience what it means to work excessive hours. The capitalist fights for his profit, the worker for his health, for a few hours of daily rest, to be able to engage in other human activities as well, besides working, sleeping and eating. It may be remarked in passing that it does not depend at all upon the good will of the individual capitalists whether they desire to embark on this struggle or not, since competition compels even the most philanthropic among us to join his colleagues and to make a working time as long as theirs the rule. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5863
Che Guevara: Democracy cannot consist solely of elections that are nearly always fictitious and managed by rich landowners and professional politicians, but rather it lies in the right of the citizens to determine their own destiny. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5864
Stalin: Contrary to metaphysics, dialectics does not regard the process of development as a simple process of growth, where quantitative changes do not lead to qualitative changes, but as a development which passes from insignificant and imperceptible quantitative changes to open' fundamental changes' to qualitative changes; a development in which the qualitative changes occur not gradually, but rapidly and abruptly, taking the form of a leap from one state to another; they occur not accidentally but as the natural result of an accumulation of imperceptible and gradual quantitative changes. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5865
Stalin: Contrary to metaphysics, dialectics holds that internal contradictions are inherent in all things and phenomena of nature, for they all have their negative and positive sides, a past and a future, something dying away and something developing; and that the struggle between these opposites, the struggle between the old and the new, between that which is dying away and that which is being born, between that which is disappearing and that which is developing, constitutes the internal content of the process of development, the internal content of the transformation of quantitative changes into qualitative changes. The dialectical method therefore holds that the process of development from the lower to the higher takes place not as a harmonious unfolding of phenomena, but as a disclosure of the contradictions inherent in things and phenomena, as a "struggle" of opposite tendencies which operate on the basis of these contradictions. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5866
Stalin: It is easy to understand how immensely important is the extension of the principles of the dialectical method to the study of social life and the history of society, and how immensely important is the application of these principles to the history of society and to the practical activities of the party of the proletariat. If there are no isolated phenomena in the world, if all phenomena are interconnected and interdependent, then it is clear that every social system and every social movement in history must be evaluated not from the standpoint of "eternal justice" or some other preconceived idea, as is not infrequently done by historians, but from the standpoint of the conditions which gave rise to that system or that social movement and with which they are connected. The slave system would be senseless, stupid and unnatural under modern conditions. But under the conditions of a disintegrating primitive communal system, the slave system is a quite understandable and natural phenomenon, since it represents an advance on the primitive communal system. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5867
Stalin: Everything depends on the conditions, time and place. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5868
Karl Marx: Our task is that of ruthless criticism, and much more against ostensible friends than against open enemies; and in maintaining this our position we gladly forego cheap democratic popularity. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5869
Gerhart Eisler: Since the moment for butchery had arrived, the Nazis seized the opportunity to do away with other adversaries of Hitler from the most diverse circles. Thus General von Schleicher and his wife, General von Bredow, and several leading Catholics were assassinated. Von Papen himself barely escaped a similar fate. Hitler had checked the danger of the 'second revolution.' Big business, the generals, and Hindenburg personally congratulated him. By moving swiftly and relentlessly against the Storm Troop leaders he had removed the possibility of a conflict between the Reichswehr and the Nazi private army, a conflict which might have been exploited by various other adversaries of the government. He had shown the stupid petty bourgeoisie, who had taken his demagogic promises seriously, who was master of Germany. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5870
Jonathan Swift: When a true genius appears, you can know him by this sign: that all the dunces are in a confederacy against him. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5871
James Baldwin: I’m not anti-Semitic at all, but I am anti-Zionist. I don’t believe they have the right, after 3,000 years, to reclaim the land with western bombs and guns on biblical injunction. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5872
John F. Kennedy: Palestine was hardly Britain’s to give away. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5873
Mao Zedong: Military action is a method used to attain a political goal. While military affairs and political affairs are not identical, it is impossible to isolate one from the other. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5874
Che Guevara: There are no borders in this fight to the death. We cannot remain indifferent to what happens anywhere in the world. A victory of any country over imperialism is a victory for us, just as the defeat of any nation is a defeat for all. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5875
Enver Hoxha: By denigrating Stalin and the social system for which he fought and worked throughout his life, reaction and all the anti-communist scum wanted to destroy not only the greatest and most powerful base of socialism, the revolution was not conquered, Marxism-Leninism was not eliminated, and socialism was not snuffed out. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5876
George Habash: The enemy can destroy our cities and refugee camps, kill our women and children, leave no brick on top of another—but he can't kill our desire to fight back. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5877
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Social
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Vincent van Gogh: Normality is a paved road: It's comfortable to walk, but no flowers grow on it. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5878
Otto von Bismarck: One day the great European War would come out of some damned foolish thing in the Balkans. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5879
Otto von Bismarck: The social insecurity of the worker is the real cause of their being a peril to the state. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5880
Otto von Bismarck: Not by speeches and votes of the majority are the great questions of the time decided — that was the error of 1848 and 1849 — but by iron and blood. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5881
Otto von Bismarck: Politics is not an exact science. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5882
Otto von Bismarck: Anyone who has once looked into the glassy eyes of a dying warrior on the battle-field would think twice before beginning a war. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5883
Otto von Bismarck: Politics is the art of the possible. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5884
Otto von Bismarck: The politician has not to revenge what has happened but to ensure that it does not happen again. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5885
Otto von Bismarck: He who has his thumb on the purse has the power. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5886
Otto von Bismarck: Preventive war is like committing suicide for fear of death. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5887
Otto von Bismarck: I will further every endeavour which positively aims at improving the condition of the working classes. ... As soon as a positive proposal came from the Socialists for fashioning the future in a sensible way, in order that the lot of the working-man might be improved, I would not at any rate refuse to examine it favourably, and I would not even shrink from the idea of State help for the people who would help themselves. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5888
Otto von Bismarck: Many measures which we have adopted to the great blessing of the country are Socialistic, and the State will have to accustom itself to a little more Socialism yet. ... I am glad that this Socialism was adopted, for we have as a consequence secured a free and very well-to-do peasantry, and I hope that we shall in time do something of the sort for the labouring classes. ... The establishment of the freedom of the peasantry was Socialistic; Socialistic, too, is every expropriation in favour of railways; Socialistic to the utmost extent is the aggregation of estates—the law exists in many provinces—taking from one and giving to another, simply because this other can cultivate the land more conveniently; Socialistic is expropriation under the Water Legislation, on account of irrigation, etc., where a man's land is taken away from him because another can farm it better; Socialistic is our entire poor relief, compulsory school attendance, compulsory construction of roads, so that I am bound to maintain a road upon my lands for travellers. That is all Socialistic, and I could extend the register further; but if you believe that you can frighten any one or call up spectres with the word “Socialism,” you take a standpoint which I abandoned long ago, and the abandonment of which is absolutely necessary for our entire imperial legislation. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5889
Otto von Bismarck: I am not antagonistic to the rightful claims of capital; I am far from wanting to flourish a hostile flag; but I am of opinion that the masses, too, have rights which should be considered. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5890
Otto von Bismarck: If an establishment employing twenty thousand or more workpeople were to be ruined...we could not allow these men to hunger. We should have to resort to real State Socialism and find work for them, and this is what we do in every case of distress. If the objection were right that we should shun State Socialism as we would an infectious disease, how do we come to organise works in one province and another in case of distress—works which we should not undertake if the labourers had employment and wages? In such cases we build railways whose profitableness is questionable; we carry out improvements which otherwise would be left to private initiative. If that is Communism, I have no objection at all to it; though with such catchwords we really get no further. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5891
Otto von Bismarck: Give the working-man the right to work as long as he is healthy, assure him care when he is sick; assure him maintenance when he is old. If you do that, and do not fear the sacrifice, or cry out at State Socialism directly the words “provision for old age” are uttered,—if the State will show a little more Christian solicitude for the working-man, then I believe that the gentlemen of the Wyden (Social-Democratic) programme will sound their bird-call in vain, and that the thronging to them will cease as soon as working-men see that the Government and legislative bodies are earnestly concerned for their welfare. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5892
Otto von Bismarck: Peasants and large landed proprietors recognise more and more that they form one and the same class, the class of land-owners, and follow one and the same industry of agriculture. ... The land-owners are, on the whole, a support of the monarchy, and their entire disposition is favourable to the existing Government; and you try to sow discord amongst them because you are displeased that the unification is proceeding gradually and unceasingly. This is the salutary effect of legislation which at first was painfully felt by many of the privileged class: the abolition of all the legal and axiomatic prerogatives of the greatest land proprietors, and especially of the earlier knighthood. We larger land-owners are in our industry to-day nothing more than the largest peasants, and the peasant is nothing more than the smaller land-owner. Indeed, most peasants call themselves land-owners, while some call themselves husbandmen and others countrymen. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5893
Otto von Bismarck: I have always found the word Europe on the lips of those politicians who wanted something from other Powers which they dared not demand in their own names. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5894
Otto von Bismarck: Struggle is everywhere, without struggle no life, and if we want to go on living, we must be ready for further struggles. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5895
John Godfrey Saxe: Laws, like sausages, cease to inspire respect in proportion as we know how they are made. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5896
Otto von Bismarck: Secret of politics? Make a good treaty with Russia. https://wordsmith.social/protestation/quotes#quote5897