QUOTES ON LIBERTY AND PROSPERITY

You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
You cannot help the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.
You cannot further the brotherhood of man by encouraging class hatred.
You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than you earn.
You cannot build character and courage by taking away man's initiative and independence.
You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.


Abraham Lincoln

"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

Benjamin Franklin

"The claims of these organizers of humanity raise another question which I have often asked them and which, so far as I know, they have never answered: If the natural tendencies of mankind are so bad that it is not safe to permit people to be free, how is it that the tendencies of these organizers are always good? Do not the legislators and their appointed agents also belong to the human race? Or do they believe that they themselves are made of a finer clay than the rest of mankind?"

Frederic Bastiat

In reference to the Roman Empire: "Here is the classic example of that kind of insincerity in both foreign and domestic affairs which permeates not only avowed motives but also probably the conscious motives of the actors themselves--that of a policy which pretends to aspire to peace but unerringly generates war, the policy of continual preparation for war, the policy of meddlesome interventionism. There was no corner of the known world where some interest was not alleged to be in danger or under actual attack. If the interests were not those of Rome, they were those of Rome's allies; and if Rome had no allies, then allies would be invented. When it was utterly impossible to contrive such an interest--why, then it was the national honour that had been insulted. The fight was always invested with an aura of legality. Rome was always being attacked by evil-minded neighbours, always fighting for a breathing space. The whole world was pervaded by a host of enemies and it was manifestly Rome's duty to guard against their indubitably aggressive designs. They were enemies who only waited to fall on the Roman people ..."

Joseph Schumpeter, The Sociology of Imperialism

The areas in which the country has done well are the areas where the government doesn't have its hand, which is information technology and beauty. We have had a whole string of Miss World contestants. We are known for our spirituality, because we don't have a ministry of religion

Kiran Karnik - President of Nasscom

Sustainable Development
“Those who fear a sudden depletion of resources do not understand economics. Predictions that we will run out of oil and other resources are notoriously inaccurate. Remember the Club of Rome? In the early 1970s the Club, a private international association of about 75 businessmen, scientists, and scholars, predicted that the world would run out of gold by 1981, mercury by 1985, tin by 1987, zinc by 1990, petroleum by 1992, and copper, lead, and natural gas by 1993. They were wrong on every single count. Not only were they wrong, but proven reserves (reserves that we know about) of most non-renewable resources, including oil, are higher than ever before.”

Laura Jones – “Is Calgary a Sustainable City”, Fraser Forum, July 2002

"What is needed to stop the trend toward socialism and despotism is common sense and moral courage"


Margaret Turnbull

The great virtue of free enterprise is that it forces existing businesses to meet the test of the market continuously, to produce products that meet consumer demands at lowest cost, or else be driven from the market. It is a profit-and-loss system. Naturally, existing businesses generally prefer to keep out competitors in other ways. That is why the business community, despite its rhetoric, has so often been a major enemy of truly free enterprise

Milton Friedman

An honest politician is one who when he is bought will stay bought.

Simon Cameron

Be thankful we're not getting all the government we're paying for.

Will Rogers

The proliferation of bureaucrats and its invariable accompaniment, much heavier tax levies on the productive part of the population, are the recognizable signs, not of a great, but of a decaying society. Historians know that both phenomena were especially marked in the declining eras of the Roman Empire in the West and of its successor state, the Eastern or Byzantine Empire.

William Henry Chamberlin

If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom; and the irony of it is that, if it is comfort or money it values more, it will lose that too.

William Somerset Maugham, 1941