Rick Shenkman > Quotes

“we’re going to react the way we react to things that happen to us—but that doesn’t mean we have to surrender to our instincts and give up the hope that we can think and behave more rationally and humanely. There’s a reason why we no longer take pleasure throwing live cats into open fires, as both kings and peasants once did. Our culture has trained us to think this is abhorrent. That’s promising.”
― Rick Shenkman, Political Animals: How Our Stone-Age Brain Gets in the Way of Smart Politics

“The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie—deliberate, contrived, and dishonest, but the myth—persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. Belief in myths allows the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought. —JOHN F. KENNEDY”
― Rick Shenkman, Just How Stupid Are We? Facing the Truth About the American Voter

“With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation’s wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan—to do all which may achieve and cherish a just, and a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.”
― Rick Shenkman, Political Animals: How Our Stone-Age Brain Gets in the Way of Smart Politics

“The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie—deliberate, contrived, and dishonest, but the myth—persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. Belief in myths allows the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.”
― Rick Shenkman, Just How Stupid Are We? Facing the Truth About the American Voter

“In Seattle, where I live, judges are elected. It is impossible to know enough about all but a handful of these judges even if one is a scrupulously attentive voter. So when the day comes to vote, I use heuristics to decide. I turn to a local free paper I trust, the Seattle Weekly, to see whom the editors are backing. Unless I have independent knowledge about one of the judges, I follow the paper’s advice.”
― Rick Shenkman, Just How Stupid Are We? Facing the Truth About the American Voter

“If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be. —THOMAS JEFFERSON”
― Rick Shenkman, Just How Stupid Are We? Facing the Truth About the American Voter