"You have allowed this dark lord to twist your mind until now you have become the very thing you swore to destroy."
—Obi-Wan Kenobi to Anakin Skywalker, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith
"Fascism is the stage reached after communism has proved an illusion."
—Friedrich Hayek
"It is one of history's ironies that Communism, advertised as a classless society, tended to breed a privileged class of feudal proportions."
—Henry Kissinger, On China
"At the very time that overt anti-Semitism was beginning to vanish from mainstream American culture, Richard Nixon was perhaps the most profoundly anti-Semitic president in U.S. history. In the Nixon tapes, he repeatedly accuses American Jews of placing "Jewish interests" before American ones, an almost verbatim reuse of one of 19th-century Europe's most pernicious anti-Semitic canards. Despite this Nixon surrounded himself with Jews at high levels in the White House: Leonard Garment (chief economic advisor), Ben Stein (chief speechwriter), William Safire (campaign manager), Murray Chotiner (adviser and campaign manager), and of course Secretary of State Henry Kissinger...Nixon's obsession with the Evil Jew was just part of a profoundly paranoid personality that saw vast, byzantine conspiracies lurking everywhere. It is ironic (but predictable) that such a committed conspiracy theorist was responsible for some of the most outrageous conspiracies ever perpetrated in American politics."
—Rational Wiki
"Rand was broken by the Bolsheviks as a girl, and she never left their bootprint behind. She believed her philosophy was Bolshevism's opposite, when in reality it was its twin. Both she and the Soviets insisted a small revolutionary elite in possession of absolute rationality must seize power and impose its vision on a malleable, imbecilic mass. The only difference was that Lenin thought the parasites to be stomped on were the rich, while Rand thought they were the poor."
"During the first Gulf War, Christopher Hitchens famously schooled Charlton Heston, asking him to name the countries surrounding Iraq, the place he was so eager to invade. A flummoxed Heston sputtered, naming a few random Middle Eastern countries (including, rather humorously, the island nation of Cyprus).
But then Hitchens decided that, in fact, bombing children was no longer so abhorrent, because these wars were no longer neocolonial wars dictated by economics and geopolitics but rather a final Armageddon between the forces of rationality and the forces of religion...Somehow the man who denounced Kissinger’s war crimes now supported Bush’s — both wars, of course, supported by the scantest of logic. The man who so eloquently chronicled the corruption of the Clinton administration became the shill of his successor."
But then Hitchens decided that, in fact, bombing children was no longer so abhorrent, because these wars were no longer neocolonial wars dictated by economics and geopolitics but rather a final Armageddon between the forces of rationality and the forces of religion...Somehow the man who denounced Kissinger’s war crimes now supported Bush’s — both wars, of course, supported by the scantest of logic. The man who so eloquently chronicled the corruption of the Clinton administration became the shill of his successor."
Sentinel Prime: Optimus, all I ever wanted was the survival of our race. You must see why I had to betray you...
Optimus Prime: You didn't betray me, you betrayed yourself.
Optimus Prime: You didn't betray me, you betrayed yourself.
But did his followers really know him? The ‘Johnson’, as they called him, did not consider the fact that the man who had died in the spinning blades of one of his machines had been, in life, one of the forgotten people he pretended to care for. He did not think about the fact that the only reason there had been no repercussion was because of the man’s lowly status. He did not know that the lonely wanderer had been cast from his work, insulating satellite interiors, when a fleet of Mecha workers had been perfected for the job. The man had lost his wife when his lack of income made the Child Licensing Authority reject his application. Nor did the ‘Johnson’ care enough to find out about these things. Lord Johnson Johnson, self-proclaimed protector of the last vestiges of Orga, had become part of the plagues that consumed them. But his followers did not know it. Nor did he. The arrogance and zeal with which he had built his temple had become the very corrupter of his message.
"What's it like to be the thing you hate?"
—Lord Deplorable, Twitter
"It's hard to remember that Edmund Zuwanie was once a good man. That's not unusual for these guys; they all begin as liberators, and twenty minutes later, they're as corrupt as the tyrants they overthrow. He liberated the country from one of the most corrupt governments on Earth. Gave the people hope, and he was a hero. They need another name for what he is now."
—Tobin Keller, The Interpreter
"It's strange... Nobody ever, um, cherished the universe the way you once did... And yet, you've been made to destroy it..."
"It doesn't matter if you say the true origin of Magic is 'Darkness,' It doesn't matter if you say it's 'Light' either. Magic is alive. Its place changes over time and it grows along with us. Magic is anything you can think of. It can be felt in infinite ways... as light, as darkness, as red, or as blue and it is living freely, together alongside Fairy Tail. All of this I learned from you, Master Precht."
"Lee, if that iPod thing is true, you're not the man I thought you were, and that's the price you'll pay for this petty victory."
—David Mitchell, after Lee Mack has claimed to have hired someone to put songs on his iPod for him, Would I Lie to You?
So now you've turned your back on all the things that you used to preach.
Now it's "Let him live in freedom - if he lives like me."
Well your line has changed, confusion reigns, what have you become?
All your olive branches turned to spears when your flowers turned to guns.
Now it's "Let him live in freedom - if he lives like me."
Well your line has changed, confusion reigns, what have you become?
All your olive branches turned to spears when your flowers turned to guns.
—Jim Croce, "Which Way Are You Going?"
Justice had never been forthcoming from the authorities and so the people had always gone to the Robin Hood Mafia. And to some extent the Mafia still fulfilled this role. People turned to their local capo mafioso for help in every emergency. He was their social worker, their district captain ready with a basket of food and a job, their protector.
But what Dr. Taza did not add, what Michael learned on his own in the months that followed, was that the Mafia in Sicily had become the illegal arm of the rich and even the auxiliary police of the legal and political structure. It had become a degenerate capitalist structure, anti-communist, anti-liberal, placing its own taxes on every form of business endeavor no matter how small.
Ra's al Ghul: This is a good day, Detective.
Batman: Good?! People are dying!
Ra's al Ghul: The world will not miss them. Why should you? Look at my work. You may have defeated Strange, but this...this is just the beginning. Come with me, and we will wipe this world clean.
Batman: Never. You're wrong, Ra's. You've become what you've always fought against, and I will stop you.
Now I believe in this and it's been tested by research
That he who fucks nuns will later join the church
That he who fucks nuns will later join the church
—The Clash, "Death or Glory"
"At least I was playing saf-...At least I was playing safe...? What!? That switch-in was unnecessary but I wanted to be SAFE instead of playing with an unnecessary risk..!? WHAT IS HAPPENING TO ME!? I am in the middle of a deathless run on accident but I am far too down this Pokétuber tunnel to the point of becoming risk adverse!? No... Nunonanonanonono... No. No! This can't be happening! That's like... my thing! Where is the loyalty to The Bit?! Did I... become everything I sought out to destroy!? You either die a hero or see yourself become the villain and with the decorated path behind me, rising from the ashes of my own mistakes like a phoenix... Oh my god... I'm not the underdog anymore... I'm SUPPOSED to win. I'm not overcoming anything... In fact, I'm just beating a game made for children with an arbitrary set of rules!"
