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The fact that war belongs to the past, does not mean it has to be part of the future.

Howard Zinn

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Howard Zinn
Age: 87 †
Born: 1922
Born: August 24
Died: 2010
Died: January 27
Film Director
Historian
Historian Of The Modern Age
Human Rights Activist
Journalist
Labor Historian
Pacifist
Peace Activist
Playwright
Brooklyn
New York
Mean
Belongs
Future
Fact
War
Facts
Past
Part
Doe

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Before God and high heaven, is there a law for one man which is not a law for every other man?
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Pessimism becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy it reproduces itself by crippling our willingness to act.
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I had always insisted that a good education was a synthesis of book learning and involvement in social action, that each enriched the other. I wanted my students to know that the accumulation of knowledge, while fascinating in itself, is not sufficient as long as so many people in the world have no opportunity to experience that fascination.
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But human beings are not machines, and however powerful the pressure to conform, they sometimes are so moved by what they see as injustice that they dare to declare their independence. In that historical possibility lies hope.
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There has always been, and there is now, a profound conflict of interest between the people and the government of the United States.
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People who have no respect for human life or for freedom or justice have taken over this beautiful country of ours. It will be up to the American people to take it back.
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Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is that people all over the world have obeyed the dictates of leaders . . . . and millions have been killed because of this obedience . . . .
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The future is an infinite succession of presents.
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When people don't understand that the government doesn't have their interests in mind, they're more susceptible to go to war.
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Americans have been taught that their nation is civilized and humane. But, too often, U.S. actions have been uncivilized and inhumane.
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Imperialism is the factor in American policy, not just since 1898, but in fact long before it when we were expanding across this continent and taking away Indian lands in order to enlarge the territory of the United States. We have been an imperial power and an expansionist power for a very long time.
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One of the problems with dealing with anarchism is that there are many people whose ideas are anarchist, but who do not necessarily call themselves anarchists.
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I will try not to overlook the cruelties that victims inflict on one another as they are jammed together in the boxcars of the system. I don’t want to romanticize them. But I do remember (in rough paraphrase) a statement I once read: “The cry of the poor is not always just, but if you don’t listen to it, you will never know what justice is.
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We need to decide that we will not go to war, whatever reason is conjured up by the politicians or the media, because war in our time is always indiscriminate, a war against innocents, a war against children.
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The only way things will happen is if people get over the notion that they must see immediate success. If they get over that notion and persist, then they will see things happen before they even realize it.
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One certain effect of war is to diminish freedom of expression.
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To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.
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Crosses and gallows - that deadly historic juxtaposition.
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I think people are dazzled by Obama's rhetoric, and that people ought to begin to understand that Obama is going to be a mediocre president — which means, in our time, a dangerous president — unless there is some national movement to push him in a better direction.
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The democratic principle, enunciated in the words of the Declaration of Independence, declared that government was secondary, that the people who established it were primary. Thus, the future of democracy depended on the people, and their growing consciousness of what was the decent way to relate to their fellow human beings all over the world.
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