Niall Ferguson Quotes
Disasters don’t always discredit ruling elites.
Much depends on the culture of the people and the power of the rulers. In Pakistan, corruption and one disaster after another occurs and neither the government nor the army—the two ruling elites—does little or nothing to help the people, yet they retain their power and support of the majority of the population. The Palestinians have been led by the PLO, Hamas, and Hezbollah, and with each decision the elite rulers make, the Israeli’s obtain more territory than they were willing to settle for earlier, the standard of living of the Palestinians degrades, their employment prospects deteriorates, and their humiliation becomes greater. Yet, the elites maintain their power.
Niall Ferguson, Historian, Speech, World Affairs Council. September 27, 2006
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
The incident to which he referred was Islamic extremist terrorists attacking with assault weapons a group of unarmed tourists killing over 30. Tunisia, although it has a large majority Muslim population, became a secular republic after its Arab Spring revolution. Tunisia's economy is dependent on tourism, which is diminished by the fear of more terrorist attacks.
See {594396} for his going a step further and advocating lying in the interest of the nation. Note that he does not consider the simple alternative of telling the voters and then fixing the problem.
Asked by one of his students about the essentials of good government:. Asked which of the three could be dispensed with first, if necessary, Confucius answered, "Armament." Asked what could be dispensed with second, he answered, "Food." The Master then added:
During the Vietnam war, some senior military leaders urged use of atomic weapons. They reported the results of a computer simulation the Pentagon had done on the number of lives that had been saved by use of the atomic bomb in World War II:
Referring to President William Clinton and his first 100 days:
Niall Campbell Ferguson is a Scottish historian and the Milbank Family Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. Previously, he was a professor at Harvard University, the London School of Economics and New York University, visiting professor at New College of the Humanities and senior research fellow at Jesus College, Oxford.
