"No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people."Turns out this is a paraphrase of an H.L. Mencken quotation:
“No one in this world has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.”The same website that provides this reference also includes the following pertinent H.L. Mencken quotations:
“Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.”... okay, there are a lot more, but I'm getting tired...
“Religion is fundamentally opposed to everything I hold in veneration - courage, clear thinking, honesty, fairness, and above all, love of the truth.”
“Evangelical Christianity, as everyone knows, is founded upon hate, as the Christianity of Christ was founded upon love.”
“It is a sin to believe evil of others, but it is seldom a mistake.”
“The average man doesn't want to be free. He wants to be safe.”
“We must respect the other fellow's religion,but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart.”
“The truth that survives is simply the lie that is pleasantest to believe.”
“Old age ain't no place for sissies.”
“The plain truth is that I am not a fair man, and don't want to hear both sides.”
“To expect defeat is nine-tenths of defeat itself.”
- [aside: this could be the Dems' motto!]
“Complex problems have simple, easy to understand, wrong answers.”
“The worst government is the most moral. One composed of cynics is often very tolerant and humane. But when fanatics are on top there is no limit to oppression.”
“The older I grow the more I distrust the familiar doctrine that age brings wisdom.”
“Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under.”
“I believe that all government is evil, and that trying to improve it is largely a waste of time.”
“Imagine the Creator as a stand up comedian - and at once the world becomes explicable.”
“The kind of man who wants government to adopt and enforce his ideas is always the kind of man whose ideas are idiotic.”
“The demagogue is one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots.”
“If you want peace, work for justice.”
“Men become civilized not in proportion to their willingness to believe but in proportion to their readiness to doubt.”
... based on these nuggets I might just seek out a volume of Mencken's writings!
Indeed. Including one of my personal mottos:
ReplyDelete"It seems to me that one of the prime jobs of every educated man on this earth is to denounce charlatans. New ones are always popping up, and the common run of idiots are always succumbing to them. There is little if any difference between one and another."
A very interesting man and some great quotes.
ReplyDeleteHe's right: Old age ain't for sissies.