A Quote by Michael Parenti

To oppose the policies of a government does not mean you are against the country or the people that the government supposedly represents. Such opposition should be called what it really is: democracy, or democratic dissent, or having a critical perspective about what your leaders are doing. Either we have the right to democratic dissent and criticism of these policies or we all lie down and let the leader, the Fuhrer, do what is best, while we follow uncritically, and obey whatever he commands. That's just what the Germans did with Hitler, and look where it got them.
BSP does not believe in organizing violent protest. It's a disciplined party and follows democratic process to oppose anti-people policies of government.
The Germans should be the first to sympathize with us [Egyptians]. They know how difficult it is to build a democracy following a dictatorship, and they were the first to be critical of Morsi's anti-democratic policies.
For us, the government of Venezuelan Nicolas Maduro is not a government that allows democratic plurality. It does not allow for there to be a real opposition, and that is not democratic.
We must dissent from the indifference. We must dissent from the apathy. We must dissent from the fear, the hatred and the mistrust. We must dissent from a nation that has buried its head in the sand, waiting in vain for the needs of its poor, its elderly, and its sick to disappear and just blow away. We must dissent from a government that has left its young without jobs, education or hope. We must dissent from the poverty of vision and the absence of moral leadership. We must dissent because America can do better, because America has no choice but to do better.
It would be kind of a tragedy if we got to the end of four years of Democratic rule without having really tried any Democratic policies.
It is dissent from government policies which defines the true Patriot
To me, democratic socialism means democracy. It means creating a government that represents all of us, not just the wealthiest people in the country.
The right to dissent is the only thing that makes life tolerable for a judge of an appellate court... the affairs of government could not be conducted by democratic standards without it.
We think the government is running the country, but it is just a policymaker. Unknowingly, people are inviting the government to run their lives. The only business of the government is to come up with the right policies.
I think some people have blind faith in American institutions without knowing a whole lot about them and think they will stand up to Donald Trump and are indestructible. I actually think democracy is not a definable and achievable state. Any country is either becoming more democratic or less democratic. I think the United States hasn't tended to its journey toward democracy in a long time. It's been becoming less democratic, and right now it's in danger of becoming drastically less democratic.
Famines are easy to prevent if there is a serious effort to do so, and a democratic government, facing elections and criticisms from opposition parties and independent newspapers, cannot help but make such an effort. Not surprisingly, while India continued to have famines under British rule right up to independence... they disappeared suddenly with the establishment of a multiparty democracy and... a free press and an active political opposition constitute the best early-warning system a country threaten by famines can have.
When a government is in fear of dissent from its own citizens, and when its reaction is to shut out that dissent, we should all worry.
I believe Tunisia and Egypt should look to Turkey and see what not to do. Turkey seems to be a secular and democratic country but it is only a show. We are losing the effectiveness of democratic institutions like parliament and judiciary. They now are turning into tools for the benefit of a president-ordering system. A democratic government is possible only on a comprehensive democratic base surrounded by the participatory action of ordinary people.
The government of the German Democratic Republic rejects secret policies. It works for the people, and only the people, so it does not need to keep secrets like the warmongers.
Freedom of speech, the right to dissent, the right to protest, that is what America is about. And politically every leader in this country and every American has got to stand up against any form of violence. That is unacceptable.
To take an analogy: if we say that a democratic government is the best kind of government, we mean that it most completely fulfills the highest function of a government - the realisation of the will of the people.
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