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This is one of the paradoxes of the democratic movement - that it loves a crowd and fears the individuals who compose it - that the religion of humanity should have no faith in human beings.

Walter Lippmann

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Walter Lippmann
Age: 85 †
Born: 1889
Born: September 23
Died: 1974
Died: December 14
Journalist
Politician
Writer
New York City
New York
Faith
Democratic
Compose
Individual
Beings
Humankind
Human
Mankind
Paradox
Humans
Movement
Crowd
Democracy
Fears
Humanity
Crowds
Freedom
Individuals
Religion
Loves
Paradoxes

More quotes by Walter Lippmann

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There are at least two distinct selves, the public and regal self, the private and human.
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A useful definition of liberty is obtained only by seeking the principle of liberty in the main business of human life, that is to say, in the process by which men educate their responses and learn to control their environment.
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To create a minimum standard of life below which no human being can fall is the most elementary duty of the democratic state.
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Without some form of censorship, propaganda in the strict sense of the word is impossible. In order to conduct propaganda there must be some barrier between the public and the event.
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The effort to calculate exactly what the voters want at each particular moment leaves out of account the fact that when they are troubled the thing the voters most want is to be told what to want.
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The public interest may be presumed to be what men would choose if they saw clearly, thought rationally, acted disinterestedly and benevolently.
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We must abandon the notion that the people govern. Instead, we must adopt the theory that, by their occasional mobilisations as a majority, people support or oppose the individuals who actually govern.
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Even God has been defended with nonsense.
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The opposition is indispensable. A good statesman, like any other sensible human being, always learns more from his opposition than from his fervent supporters.
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In a place where everybody thinks alike, nobody thinks very much.
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Football strategy does not originate in a scrimmage: it is useless to expect solutions in a political campaign.
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Nobody has yet found a way of bombing that can prevent foot soldiers from walking.
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The present crisis of Western democracy is a crisis in journalism.
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Life can be swamped by sex very easily if sex is not normally satisfied.
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If all power is in the people, if there is no higher law than their will, and if by counting their votes, their will may be ascertained - then the people may entrust all their power to anyone, and the power of the pretender and the usurper is then legitimate. It is not to be challenged since it came originally from the sovereign people.
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The facts we see depend on where we are placed and the habits of our eyes.
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When philosophers try to be politicians they generally cease to be philosophers.
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The function of news is to signalize an event, the functionoftruth istobring to lightthehiddenfacts, toset them into relationwith each other, and make a picture of reality on which men can act.Only at those points, where social conditions take recognizable and measurable shape, do the body of truth and the body of news coincide.
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Corrupt, stupid grasping functionaries will make at least as big a muddle of socialism as stupid, selfish and acquisitive employers can make of capitalism.
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Lovers who have nothing to do but love each other are not really to be envied love and nothing else very soon is nothing else.
Walter Lippmann