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A Stalin functionary admitted, Innocent people were arrested: naturally - otherwise no one would be frightened. If people were arrested only for specific misdemeanours, all the others would feel safe and so become ripe for treason.

Paul Johnson

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Paul Johnson
Age: 96
Born: 1928
Born: November 2
Editor
Historian
Journalist
Speechwriter
Writer
Manchester
England
Paul Bede Johnson
Feels
Naturally
Functionary
Would
Innocent
Stalin
People
Otherwise
Admitted
Safe
Treason
Fear
Ripe
Others
Arrested
Become
Frightened
Feel
Specific

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In the long term, it is desirable that the human race, faced with the prospect of extinction on Earth, should prepare an escape route for itself to another inhabitable planet.
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The word 'meaningful' when used today is nearly always meaningless.
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My grandfather used to say, Learn to like art, music and literature deeply and passionately. They will be your friends when things are bad. It is true: at this time of year, when days are short and dark, and one hardly dares to open the newspapers, I turn, not vainly either, to the great creators of the past for distraction, solace and help.
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Democracy has many enemies, and the terrorist is only one of them.
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Hell is being trapped in a night-club with the'beautiful people'and forced to live in a'luxury penthouse flat'.
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There are no inevitabilities in history
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If I see a door ajar, I push on it to see how far it will open, and if it opens wide I go through it.
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Scanning the newspapers and absorbing with a mixture of incredulity and indignation the enormities they report, I conclude that what England lacks today is, quite simply, sense.
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I like that lady - Sarah Palin. She's great. I like the cut of her jib.
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I've been having an affair, but I still believe in family values.
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The Second World War took place not so much because no one won the First, but because the Versailles Treaty did not acknowledge this truth.
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I was very fond of Princess Diana. She used to have me over to lunch to ask my advice. I'd give her good advice, and she'd say: 'I entirely agree. Paul, you're so right.' Then she'd go and do the opposite.
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Conservation of energy. Never stand up when you can sit down, and never sit down when you can lie down.
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The most evil person I ever met was a toss-up between Pablo Picasso and the publisher-crook Robert Maxwell.
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If we want foxes, to observe and delight in, we must have hunting.
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This book is dedicated to the people of America--strong, outspoken, intense in their convictions, sometimes wrong-headed but always generous and brave, with a passion for justice no nation has ever matched.
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In the past, the U.S. has shown its capacity to reinvent its gifts for leadership. During the 1970s, in the aftermath of the Nixon abdication and the Ford and Carter presidencies, the whole nation peered into the abyss, was horrified by what it saw and elected Ronald Reagan as president, which began a national resurgence.
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Nothing appeals to intellectuals more than the feeling that they represent 'the people'. Nothing, as a rule, is further from the truth
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Long periods of recession, which tend to be self-perpetuating, are usually ended by war, or by preparations for it.
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Human beings are infinitely worth studying, especially the peculiarities that often go along with outstanding gifts.
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