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Liberalism's fatal flaw,... is that it has no permanent norms, only a succession of enthusiasms espoused by minor prophets. Each of these seems like a hot new idea to liberals, but soon goes to irksome and destructive extremes.

Joseph Sobran

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Joseph Sobran
Age: 64 †
Born: 1946
Born: February 23
Died: 2010
Died: September 30
Journalist
Writer
Ypsilanti
Michigan
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Hot
Minors
Enthusiasms
Enthusiasm
Norm
Irksome
Permanent
Liberals
Norms
Soon
Flaws
Flaw
Goes
Liberalism
Prophets
Idea
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Succession
Seems
Destructive
Minor
Ideas
Extremes
Fatal
Espoused

More quotes by Joseph Sobran

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Thus does a 'necessary evil' become an idol. Maybe we're stuck with it. But do we have to worship it?
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There has never been a humane communist regime. Marxism is inherently totalitarian. It recognizes no moral limits on the state. It’s the most convenient ideology for aspiring tyrants it also retains its appeal for intellectuals, who have proved equally skillful at rationalizing abuses of power and at exculpating themselves.
Joseph Sobran
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Chesterton spoke of 'the modern and morbid habit of always sacrificing the normal to the abnormal.' It would be hard to sum up liberalism for succinctly.
Joseph Sobran
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The liberal understanding of 'the separation of church and state' means that as the area of politics expands, the area of private freedom - religious and otherwise - shrinks.
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If Communism was liberalism in a hurry, liberalism is Communism in slow motion.
Joseph Sobran
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Democracy has proved only that the best way to gain power over people is to assure the people that they are ruling themselves. Once they believe that, they make wonderfully submissive slaves.
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Not surprisingly, the federal judiciary nearly always rules in favor of the federal government. Judicial review, contrary to the assurances of its advocates, has hardly restrained Congress at all. Instead it has progressively stripped the states of their traditional powers, while allowing federal power to grow unchecked.
Joseph Sobran
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Politicians never accuse you of 'greed' for wanting other people's money - only for wanting to keep your own money.
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Government has ceased to mean upholding and reinforcing the traditional rights and morals of the governed it now means compulsion in the service of social engineering.
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The attempt to silence a man is the greatest honor you can bestow on him. It means that you recognize his superiority to yourself.
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Why does corruption in government always surprise us? Why do we expect anything else from it? Government is organized force. It takes our wealth and makes war. And we think honest men would do that work?
Joseph Sobran
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I realize that the New York Times probably not written for the express purpose of driving me mad I think of it as liberalism's daily bulletin board.
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If we need women in our defense forces, we must not need much defense.
Joseph Sobran
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If one person in America had starved over the last 20 years, you, reader, would know his name. The media would see to that. It would be the most thoroughly documented death since John Kennedy's.
Joseph Sobran
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The prospect of a government that treats all its citizens as criminal suspects is more terrifying than any terrorist. And even more frightening is a citizenry that can accept the surrender of its freedoms as the price of freedom.
Joseph Sobran
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It's I politics that men are always aggravating the hopeless tangle of their laws, obscuring the simplest principles and making a mockery of liberty.
Joseph Sobran
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Tyranny may creep in under the outward forms of traditional law.
Joseph Sobran
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...[T]he Constitution conferred only a few specific powers on the federal government, all others being denied to it (as the Tenth Amendment would make plain). Unfortunately, only a tiny fraction of the U.S. population today - subtle logicians like you - can grasp such nuances. Too bad. The Constitution wasn't meant to be a brain-twister.
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Liberalism is really piecemeal socialism, and socialism always attacks three basic social institutions: religion, the family, and private property. Religion, because it offers a rival authority to the state the family, because it means a rival loyalty to the state and property, because it means material independence of the state.
Joseph Sobran
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Most Americans aren't the sort of citizens the Founding Fathers expected they are contented serfs. Far from being active critics of government, they assume that its might makes it right.
Joseph Sobran