Great Quotes II: Source and Context are Key

[Dachs]

"These combined factors - a fatal attraction for what US National Security Adviser Anthony Lake once called 'a quick fix solution,' the lack of a genuine interest at the government level, and the short attention span of the general public - have given us the 'Great Lakes crisis' storyboard of the past thirteen years:

1994: Genocide in Rwanda. Horror.

1995: Festering camps. Keep feeding them and it will eventually work out.

1996: Refugees have gone home. It is now all over except in Zaire.

1997: Mobutu has fallen. Democracy has won.

1998: Another war. These people are crazy.

1999: Diplomats are negotiating. It will eventually work out.

2000: Blank

2001: President Kabila is shot. But his son seems like a good sort, doesn't he?

2002: Pretoria Peace Agreement. We are now back to normal.

2003: These fellows still insist on money. What is the minimum price?

2004: Do you think Osama bin Laden is still alive?

2005: Three million Africans dead. This is unfortunate.

2006: Actually, it might be four million. But since the real problem is al Qaeda, this remains peripheral.

2007: They have had their election, haven't they? Then everything should be all right.

The result is rather strange. A situation of major conflict is reduced to a comic book atmosphere in which absolute horror alternates with periods of almost complete disinterest from the nonspecialists."

-Gérard Prunier, Africa's World War: Congo, the Rwandan Genocide, and the Making of a Continental Catastrophe

 

[Phrossack]

"These combined factors - a fatal attraction for what US National Security Adviser Anthony Lake once called 'a quick fix solution,' the lack of a genuine interest at the government level, and the short attention span of the general public - hav given us the 'Great Lakes crisis' storyboard of the past thirteen years:

1994: Genocide in Rwanda. Horror.

1995: Festering camps. Keep feeding them and it will eventually work out.

1996: Refugees have gone home. It is now all over except in Zaire.

1997: Mobutu has fallen. Democracy has won.

1998: Another war. These people are crazy.

1999: Diplomats are negotiating. It will eventually work out.

2000: Blank

2001: President Kabila is shot. But his son seems like a good sort, doesn't he?

2002: Pretoria Peace Agreement. We are now back to normal.

2003: These fellows still insist on money. What is the minimum price?

2004: Do you think Osama bin Laden is still alive?

2005: Three million Africans dead. This is unfortunate.

2006: Actually, it might be four million. But since the real problem is al Qaeda, this remains peripheral.

2007: They have had their election, haven't they? Then everything should be all right.

The result is rather strange. A situation of major conflict is reduced to a comic book atmosphere in which absolute horror alternates with periods of almost complete disinterest from the nonspecialists."

-Gérard Prunier, Africa's World War: Congo, the Rwandan Genocide, and the Making of a Continental Catastrophe

Might have to read that. He makes an excellent point.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

"The destruction of Moscow could be assured so that peace and harmony might prevail."
-section on UK nuclear strategy, The Moscow Criterion

 

[Thorvald of Lym]

Aw man, I wanted to bump the thread.


"Imagine an army of young people five million strong. Imagine their passion to arise as a youth force that effectively decided who would get elected to political office—a force so powerful that it literally began to change their nation. This actually happened; they called themselves the Hitler Youth and they changed the face of their nation and the world. If they could mobilize their cause to become that mighty with the power of evil backing them, how much more could we accomplish with the power of God backing us up?"

- Faytene Kryskow, Toronto Missionfest 2008

 

[Phrossack]

"... the limbs within give life to the armour's pliant scales so artfully conjoined, and strike terror into the beholder. 'Tis as though iron statues (simulacra) moved and men lived cast from the same metal ... each stands alone, a pleasure yet a dread to behold, beautiful yet terrible..."

-Claudius Claudianus, In Rufinum, on the heavy cavalry of Rufinus.

 

[Traitorfish]

"Imagine an army of young people five million strong. Imagine their passion to arise as a youth force that effectively decided who would get elected to political office—a force so powerful that it literally began to change their nation. This actually happened; they called themselves the Hitler Youth and they changed the face of their nation and the world. If they could mobilize their cause to become that mighty with the power of evil backing them, how much more could we accomplish with the power of God backing us up?"

- Faytene Kryskow, Toronto Missionfest 2008

"Hitler Youth, but, like, nice" is not the best pitch I've ever heard.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

"Half of writing history is hiding the truth." - Malcolm "Captain Tight Pants" Reynolds

 

[bhsup]

"Let me tell you something. If the U.S. government decides to stick a tracking device up your arse, you say, "Thank you, and God Bless America!"" - Red Forman

 

[cardgame]

"Can you believe that guy? What a weirdo."

"You mean Dave? What's wrong with Dave, he's a sweetheart."

"I donno. He just kept talking about space the whole evening. Kinda gay. Anyway, let's , babe. Time to get down."

"I'm not DTF. I'm DTS. I want to go to space. With Dave."

"Cockblocked by the ASTRODESIRES of some UGLY MOOK?!? NOOOOOO"

- PsychopompPoet

 

[Gucumatz]

Just as a child respects his father even when he perceives his weaknesses and faults, so a German will not despise the old Germany which was once a symbol of greatness to him.

-- Stresemann

One of the greatest and perhaps underappreciated leaders of Germany ever. Managing the chaos that was Germany after WW1 was one of the most chaotic things any leader could have done. Edit: I really messed up my post here >.<. And yes, Stresemann was transitional after WW1, not 2.

 

[Traitorfish]

Wait, is he saying that he respects Hitler?

 

[Kyriakos]

Wait, is he saying that he respects Hitler?

I bet it sounds better in the original german

 

[Tee Kay]

Wait, is he saying that he respects Hitler?

Stresemann died before Hitler came to power IIRC so that can't be it.

 

[Gucumatz]

Edited my post - don't know what I was thinking when I wrote it like that, I meant after WWI not WWII. His negotiations with the French are still among the most interesting bits of German diplomacy ever. He also has several quotes warning about how the extremists wouldn't accept the peace forever unless he could give them something big but while he was working multiple angles he never could before he died reunite the lost German territories in the war

 

[Gucumatz]

Presidents quickly realize that while a single act might destroy the world they live in, no one single decision can make life suddenly better or can turn history around for the good.

- LBJ

 

[Thorvald of Lym]

"Hitler Youth, but, like, nice" is not the best pitch I've ever heard.

Needless to say, the audience was speechless.

The Religious Right would be hilarious if it wasn't so damn scary.

 

[Dachs]

Edited my post - don't know what I was thinking when I wrote it like that, I meant after WWI not WWII. His negotiations with the French are still among the most interesting bits of German diplomacy ever. He also has several quotes warning about how the extremists wouldn't accept the peace forever unless he could give them something big but while he was working multiple angles he never could before he died reunite the lost German territories in the war

It's important to temper one's enthusiasm about the Stresemann Era there. Yes, Locarno was a real achievement. Yes, Stresemann was light-years away from the Nazi lunatics that eventually seized control of Germany. But "reuniting the lost territories" was not exactly a pacifistic foreign policy. A very big part of Stresemann's politics with regards to the West was that there was an implicit understanding that this agreement cleared the way for an increasingly free German hand in the East, and a loosening of the Versailles restrictions on Germany's military.

This is much of why the West was so resigned to Hitler's first several moves in foreign policy - abrogating Versailles, reoccupying the Rhineland, reincorporating Austria. The British and French leadership had already tacitly agreed to those things when Stresemann was running Germany's foreign ministry. Even the German rearmament predated the Third Reich. It seemed to many that Hitler was just continuing along the same path that Stresemann had set Germany on, and it was 'only to be expected'.

None of that makes Stresemann in any way responsible for the Second World War, of course. But still.

 

[ReindeerThistle]

It's also proof that if the KPD had any effin' stones, Germany may have had a socialist revolution. However, they went fascist and 40% went socialist after the war.

Sent via mobile.

 

[Dachs]

It's also proof that if the KPD had any effin' stones, Germany may have had a socialist revolution. However, they went fascist and 40% went socialist after the war.

Sent via mobile.

Stones don't tend to work as well as guns, and the German military had a lot of guns. If a socialist revolution didn't work in 1919 when the conditions were infinitely more favorable, why would it have worked in 1933?

How about a quote? This is from John Scalzi's Redshirts.

---

"In all my research there's only one spaceship I've found that has even remotely the same sort of statistical patterns for away missions," Jenkins said. He rummaged through the graphic elements again, and then threw one onto the screen. They all stared at it.

Duvall frowned. "I don't recognize the ship," she said. "And I thought I knew every type of ship we had. Is this a Dub U ship?"

"Not exactly," Jenkins said. "It's from the United Federation of Planets."

Duvall blinked and focused her attention back at Jenkins. "Who are they?" she asked.

"They don't exist," Jenkins said, and pointed back at the ship. "And neither does this. This is the starship Enterprise. It's fictional. It was on a science fictional drama series. And so are we."

 

[Takhisis]

'Football, bloody hell'.

-SAF, 1999.