A Quote by Jack McDevitt
The problem is that too often the only people who can act don't want change. Power doesn't so much corrupt as it breeds conservatism.
Related Quotes
It is supposed that power corrupts,' the caterpillar said in a voice as untroubled as time itself. "yet the powerful are often corrupt before they are powerful. In fact, I find that they too often become powerful by being corrupt. Whether real or perceived, a lack of power can also corrupt.
Conservatism is not the problem. Conservatism is the founding of this country, essentially. Conservatism isn't even really an ideology. Conservatism is just what is right, proper, decent, and moral. That's all it is.
Here's the thing: celebrities understand the power of original ideas because often that's why they act. They want to be in movies that tell a story. They know the power of iconic imagery. Often, you find that people really want to participate.
In the last quarter of the 20th century, Britons have been understandably obsessed with the problem of having too little power in the world. In the third quarter of the 18th century, by contrast, their forebears were perplexed by the problem of having acquired too much power too quickly over too many people.
Success breeds conservatism, and that means a love affair with the status quo and an aversion to change.
I was very, very concerned about President Obama and how much executive order and how much executive power he tried to exert. But I think I want to be, and I think congress will be, a check on any executive, Republican or Democrat, that tries to grasp too much power. And really, a lot of the fault is not only presidents trying to take too much power, it's Congress giving up too much power.
Power is supposed to be so corrupt. I don't think it's so much corrupt, in the usual sense of the word, as stupid and unrealistic. The more power a person has, the further he gets from reality.
I'm not denying I've espoused and promoted conservatism, because conservatism's the alternative. And conservatism works every time it's tried. That's the problem. It really hasn't been tried. Even people claiming to be conservative, when it comes time to actually do it, chicken out.
Clinging to any form of conservatism can be dangerous. Become too conservative and you are unprepared for surprises. You cannot depend on luck. Logic is blind and often knows only its own past. Logic is good for playing chess but is often too slow for the needs of survival.
Climate change is important to Malawi, but many people see alternative energy more as a means to skip the government and get electricity and power. Deforestation is a huge problem in Malawi, which only adds to the problem. People cut down trees because they have no power to run electric stoves, etc. So they use firewood.
The thing I love so much about the UN, is that they're so obviously corrupt. It's not like the Oil-for-Food scandal was even hard to discover, it was almost a parody of corruption. The behavior of the delegates in New York is comically corrupt as well. The amazing thing is that there are still people who want to give the UN MORE power, and to become a real world government... Sigh
We live in an era when rapid change breeds fear, and fear too often congeals us into a rigidity which we mistake for stability.
We have to change the system. The system is very rotten. The executive is corrupt, the Congress is corrupt, the judiciary is corrupt. ... So what's left We really have to have a radical and surgical change to bring back the image of our country.
The lordship of man over man is the root cause of all corrupt rule. In the light of this principle, no laws are legitimate except God's law, and no government is legitimate except those who rule as God's deputies, implementing God's laws alone, which no-one has the power to change. So I say to you: if you really want to root out corruption now so widespread on God's earth, stand up and fight against corrupt rule; take power and use it on God's behalf. It is useless to think you change things by preaching alone.
You're in a terrible spot. It's too late for you to retreat but too soon to act. All you can do is witness. You're in the miserable position of an infant who cannot return to the mother's womb, but neither can he run around and act. All an infant can do is witness and listen to the stupendous tales of action being told to him. You are at that precise point now. You cannot go back to the womb of your old world, but you cannot act with power either. For you there is only witnessing acts of power and listening to tales of power.
Too much redesign has to do more with fad and fashion than with fitness and function. It is change for the sake of change. Such redesign is not only unnecessary, it is all too often also retrogressive, leading to things that work less effectively than those they were designed to replace.
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