"Every truth goes through three stages before it is recognized.  In the first, it is ridiculed.  In the second, it is opposed.  In the third it is regarded as self evident."

-- Arthur Schopenhauer

     "If it is immoral for an able-bodied person, who can and should take care of himself, to place himself on the government dole, what makes it any less immoral for parents, who can and should take care of their children's education, to place their families on the public school dole?"

--Paul T. Mero
President, Sutherland Institute

     "It's OK to lie for the kingdom of God."

--Jim Harmston
SL Tribune, Jan. 29, 2002

* * * * * *
And who is the father of all lies?

     "To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public."

--Teddy Roosevelt

     "Wouldn't it be a fascinating irony if another manifestation of 'The first shall be last, and the last shall be first' were to be that paganism, from which Judaism and Christianity was an upward transformation (as Mormonism was of Christianity), were to be elevated in the latter days and its godly roots acknowledged and honored (along with its perversions being revealed and purified)!
     "Sorry to say so much in a sentence. Its either that or a book."

-- Sterling D. Allan
January 23, 2002

     "If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator."

—President-Elect George W. Bush
CNN News, Aired December 18, 2000 - 12:00 p.m. ET

     "Kids need love the most when they're acting most unlovable"

--Erma Bombeck

     "We believe in the infallibility of the president of the Church so long as he is living. However, after he is dead, his statements are subject to error. The longer he has been dead, the more cautiously one should view his words."

-- 14th Article of Faith (spoof)
according to J.J. Dewey

     "We must speak the truth about terror. Let us never tolerate outrageous conspiracy theories concerning the attacks of September the 11th, malicious lies that attempt to shift the blame away from the terrorists themselves, away from the guilty."

-- President George W. Bush
speaking before the UN General Assembly 11/10/2001
(commentary)

Hugh Nibley on MORMON  KITSCH

     "...We in the church today do seem to have an incurable appetite for trite and sentimental 'kitsch'..."  (AZ 2)

    "One has only to consider the present outpouring of 'inspirational' books in the church that bring little new in the way of knowledge: truism and platitudes, kitsch, and clichés have become our everyday diet." (AZ 75)

    "Applied to the gospel, kitsch puts everything on the telestial level, easy access to all, no effort required.  But kitsch runs counter to everything the gospel stands for; it seeks to escape the impact of reality by limiting our vision to safe and familiar objects." (BCS 365)

    "Kitsch is out for the general market and deliberately chooses to appeal through the commonplace, ordinary, conventional, things that disturb nobody." (BCS 367)

(I'm not sure that Kitsch is the appropriate scapegoat metaphor here.  Green Jell-O might have been more fitting.)

     "If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy."

-- James Madison
while a United States Congressman

     "To those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberty, my message is this: Your tactics only aid terrorists."

-- Attorney General John Ashcroft
defending his antiterror measures before the Senate Judiciary Committee
(He should be summarily released and sent to 1938 Germany)

* * * * * * *
See commentary on this quote by William Norman Grigg of "Review of the News Online"
The Perils of Totalitarian "Patriotism"

     "The prohibition of dissent (through the church's loyal critics) ... facilitates idolatry.  It stimulates the adulation of authority, priesthood, church affiliation, theology, scripture, rules, and traditions rather than the worship of God."

-- Paul Toscano
"The Sanctity of Dissent" Chapter Eight

     "It is God's place to forgive Osama Bin Laden for his sins and crimes. It is the Marines' place to arrange that meeting face to face, as soon as possible."

-- a young Marine

     "We must speak the truth about terror. Let us never tolerate outrageous conspiracy theories concerning the attacks of September the 11th, malicious lies that attempt to shift the blame away from the terrorists themselves, away from the guilty."

-- George W. Bush
speaking before the UN General Assembly 11/10/2001

* * * * * *

    "I am not a crook."

-- President Nixon
Nov. 17, 2001; Watergate Investigation

* * * * * *

    "I am no devil, for there is none."

-- Satan
II Nephi 28:22

    "One of the prime indicators of a lack of altruistic motive in disbursing drugs is that the perpetrators live lifestyles far in excess of the average citizen, rather than sharing their substance with those who stand in need. It might be said that the margin of profit from a drug is proportional to its deleterious effects on society. The higher the harm, the more the profit incentive needed to cover up the crime and the conscience."

-- Declaration of Principles
Remnant Saints International Patriot Alliance

    "The 'Patriot Act' will probably go down in history as one of the most unpatriotic acts ever -- a classic case of Orwellian double-speak."

-- Sterling D. Allan

     "In the hours after the World Trade Center Collapsed . . . the government didn't declare martial law -- in a way, it didn't have to.  Americans were deciding on their own that individual rights will have to yield more to law enforcement."

-- Adam Cohen
On Magazine (TIME supplement), "Keeping an Eye on Things"
December 2001, p. 49.

     "What is the mystery . . . about a society that has the manners of a rock band, the morals of a soap opera, the decision-making ability of the Simpsons and wants to pay for government with Visa and American Express? Why should we be surprised that our underlying culture is constructed from the ratings-based, given-them-what-they-want, remote-controlled, quick-zap world of commercial television?"

-- Former editor of Chicago Tribune
Quoted in Standing for Something by Gordon B. Hinckley

     "Like many pastors, I've wept and grieved over this awful calamity [911]. I've sought the Lord in prayer and through his Word. And I want to tell you, I've experienced a grief that's even deeper than the mourning for innocent people dying. It's a grief that says if we miss God's message, if we turn a deaf ear to what he's loudly proclaiming, then much worse is in store for us."

-- David Wilkerson, Oct. 8, 2001

     "It is the duty of nations as well as of men to own their dependence upon the overruling power of God; to confess their sins and transgressions in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon; and to recognize the sublime truth, announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations are blessed whose God is the Lord."

-- Abraham Lincoln
1863 Thanksgiving Proclamation

     "The real security threat to this nation lurks in its highest leadership."

-- Sterling D. Allan
Security Frenzy Misplaced

     "A great apostasy has taken place from 'the law and the testimony' of American democracy, or the Constitution of the United States.  Just as there has been an apostasy from the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, there has been an apostasy from those divinely given principles of Government which have been transmitted to us by the inspired men who founded this nation."

-- Bishop Joseph L. Wirthlin
LDS Conference Report 10/41:70

"His entire address was endorsed by President Heber J. Grant 'with all my heart'"

-- Prophets, Principles, and National Survival
Jerreld L. Newquist; Publishers Press; 1964; p. 143

     "And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ."

-- Revelation 12:17

     "But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and then denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country."

-- [Braut] Hermann Goering

     "We will ask state and local officials to create a new modern civil defense service, similar to local volunteer fire departments, to respond to local emergencies when the manpower of governments is stretched thin."

-- President George W. Bush
Speech to the nation Nov. 8, 2001

(calling for Militia assistance without using the "M" word)
www.patriotalliance.com/Civil_Defense_Militia_Petition 

     "The time is coming that whoever kills you will think that he offers God service.  And these things they will do to you because they have not known the Father nor me."

-- John 16:2b-3

     "If only one person knows the truth, it is still the truth"

-- Gandhi

     "...The thought has crossed my mind that John the Revelator mistook what he saw....it was actually ' $$$ ' which symbol he didn't recognize.....but which we today know runs the world....."

-- Dave Gaefke 
gaefkes@localisps.net

* * * * *

Rather than say that John mistook what he saw, we can acknowledge that this is yet another manifestation of 666 worth considering, as it has an infinite number of facets.

-- Sterling

     "It’s a very serious analytic error to say, as is commonly done, that terrorism is the weapon of the weak. Like other means of violence, it’s primarily a weapon of the strong, overwhelmingly, in fact. It is held to be a weapon of the weak because the strong also control the doctrinal systems and their terror doesn’t count as terror."

-- Noam Chomsky

"No one gets out alive."

-- William C. Colbert,
Postal Worker, Mail Sorting Equipment
(and brother-in-law)

* * * * *

Actually, that isn't quite true, when you believe as I do that others besides Moses can be transfigured, and that this will become the norm in the coming utopia.

-- Sterling D. Allan

    "There are thousands of the Islamic nation's youths who are eager to die just as the Americans are eager to live"