Steve

“What constitutes a civil society? At minimum, it is a place where ideas, of all kinds, can be criticized without the risk of physical violence. If you live in a land where certain things cannot be said about the king, or about an imaginary being, or about certain books, because such utterances carry the penalty of death, torture, or imprisonment, you do not live in a civil society. It”
― Sam Harris, The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason

“I think the writing of literature should give pleasure. What else should it be about? It is not nuclear physics. It actually has to give pleasure or it is worth nothing.”
― Stephen Greenblatt

“The Framers were realists who wrote the Constitution in the shadow of the Articles of Confederation, the disastrously ineffective system of government that allowed a minority of members of Congress to block the majority from acting.”
― Adam Jentleson, Kill Switch: The Rise of the Modern Senate and the Crippling of American Democracy

“For Calhoun, minority rights were a cloak for the interests of the wealthy, the powerful, and most of all, the white supremacist.”
― Adam Jentleson, Kill Switch: The Rise of the Modern Senate and the Crippling of American Democracy