Lee Kuan Yew Quotes
If it is not totalitarian to arrest a man and detain him, when you cannot charge him with any offence against any written law --- if that is not what we have always cried out against in Fascist states -- then what is it?
Even in the United States, there have been occasions where this has happened such as the Japanese American internment in WWII, and the George W. Bush Administrations actions in fighting the War on Terror. Yew was in opposition at the time he made this famous statement. 30 years later when he was the Prime Minister, he had a different view. See {585201}.
Lee Kuan Yew, Prime Minister of Singapore, Legislative Assembly Debate, April 27, 1955
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Contrast this quotation with {585205} and {585206}. When younger, he was an ardent democrat and human rights advocate. Once in power however, he advocated and did all the totalitarian things that he used to rail about.
In the aftermath of 9-11, a few government agencies violated the law and civil rights of a number of “Muslims” and/or “Middle Eastern looking” individuals and held them incommunicado with no charges and no warrants. The rationale of those agencies is that they “could not take a chance as lives were at stake. In most major wars in America, there has been an “overreaction” by some officials.
See {42210}, {626788}, {626784}. Palmer had been a potential Presidential candidate until his excesses ended that possibility.
- Born: September 16, 1923
- Died: March 23, 2015
- Nationality: American
- Profession: Artist
Lee Kuan Yew GCMG CH SPMJ, often referred to by his initials LKY, was a Singaporean statesman and lawyer who served as Prime Minister of Singapore from 1959 to 1990. As one of the founding members of the People's Action Party, Lee is recognised as the nation's founding father, credited with rapidly transitioning the country from a "developing third world country into a developed first world country within a single generation" under his leadership. Lee died of pneumonia on 23 March 2015, aged 91. In a week of national mourning, about 1.7 million Singaporean residents as well as world leaders paid tribute to him at his lying-in-state at Singapore's Parliament House and at community tribute sites around the country.
