Glenn Reynolds Quotes

You can't be halfhearted in a revolution. Values that serve well in a civil society don't work in a state of nature.

If you only stand up for speech you approve of, you're a hack. If you only stand up for speech that everyone approves of, you're a coward.

I can think of no better reason to vote against Obama than the prospect of an administration where any criticism of the President is treated as racism.

That's the thing about conspiracy theories: in a comforting sort of way, they give rise to the feeling that someone, somewhere, knows what's going on.

Where the U.N. is concerned, accountability is very thin on the ground in general.

As the interned American citizens of Japanese descent learned, the Bill of Rights provided them with little protection when it was needed.

[T]he notion that a belief in self-reliance cannot coexist with a spirit of generosity is crap. In fact, one is far less likely to find a spirit of generosity among the advocates of governmentally-required "compassion".

The purpose of the right to bear arms is twofold; to allow individuals to protect themselves and their families, and to ensure a body of armed citizenry from which a militia could be drawn, whether that militia's role was to protect the nation, or to protect the people from a tyrannical government.

Let's be honest: Kerry has no idea what it is to be even a middle-class white in this country.

Things that can't go on forever, won't. Debts that can't be paid, won't be.

Government, we are sometimes told, is just another word for things we choose to do together. Like a lot of things politicians say, this sounds good. And, also like a lot of things politicians say, it isn't the least bit true. Many of the things government does, we don't choose. Many of the things we choose, government doesn't do. And whatever gets done, we're not the ones doing it. And those who are doing it often interpret their mandates selfishly.

Diplomacy has more to do with (credible) threats than with sweet reason. And threats from America are a lot more credible, nowadays.

[W]hen you align yourself exclusively with one party, and weaponize yourself in that party's cause, you're going to pay the price when the other party is in power. That's the price you pay for whoring yourself out.

If you're a Republican who's a threat to the Democrats, of course you are a racist. That's the definition of a racist, nowadays ...

I can't say I'm surprised: the grassroots antiwar movement keeps turning out to be MoveOn/A.N.S.W.E.R. astroturf.

I'd actually love to think that I could trust Kerry on national security. But the only way I could do that, at this point, would be via self-delusion.

But remember: All this talk of tolerance and diversity is basically just a way for one group of white people to pursue power over other groups of white people. It's not about actually helping anyone.

Democrats don't represent the taxpayers, they represent the tax-consumers ...

Bush is quite vulnerable if the Democrats pick the right issues. So far, though, they've shown their usual tendency to go for the capillary.

It's not so much about the cause, it's about feeling superior to political opponents.

Hmm. Petty? Yes. Ineffectual? Yes. Infuriating and off-putting? Yes. Counterproductive? Yes. It's got to be a product of the French Foreign Ministry.

The nannyism is partly to distract from the corruption - and partly just another opportunity to leverage it. A good general rule is that the more a government wants to run its citizens' lives, the worse job it will do at the most basic tasks of government.

As my father-in-law once said, when they talk about taxes it's always for teachers, firemen, and police - but when they spend your taxes, it always seems to go to some guy in a leather chair downtown you never heard of.

A 'well regulated militia' was thus one that was well-trained and equipped, not one that was 'well-regulated' in the modern sense of being subjected to numerous government prohibitions and restrictions.