Thomas Paine Quotes

Small islands, not capable of protecting themselves, are the proper objects for kingdoms to take under their care; but there is something absurd, in supposing a continent to be perpetually governed by an island.

If some peoples pretend that history or geography gives them the right to subjugate other races, nations, or peoples, there can be no peace.

We express our indignation at the gross insensitivity of the so-called great or superpowers of the world toward small and defenseless nations and racial minorities of the world, and the cynical manner in which they are used or abused by these powers to further what they believe to be their interests or the interests of their allies

Having lost the old ways, we Cherokee must Consider that we cannot live without the English, for they have all their goods of the English and Arms … without which we could not go to War and so we will always be ruled by them.

I have long been wanting to draw to my readers' attention the fact that the U.S., in refusing to accept Hawaii and Alaska as states, is subjecting these two territories to colonialism.

Existing colonial empires rest upon insecure foundations. There seems, indeed, something unnatural in the spectacle of seven million Dutch ruling over fifty million Malays.

The West sees liberation movements as terrorist movements, and that is why I am accused of supporting terrorism: because I support liberation movements.

In America you have the mouse now trying to sit down on the elephant, thinking that he's going somewhere. And it's - and it's absurd.

Colonialism. The enforced spread of the rule of reason. But who is going to spread it among the colonizers?

I felt in him what women feel in men, something so tender, swollen, tyrannical, absurd; I would never take the consequences of interfering with it.

People know when they are being lied to, they know when their rulers are absurd, they know they do not love their chains.

Englishmen must have an island.

We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity.

Sovereignty no longer resides in the territory itself, but in the control of the territory. And localisation is an inherent part of that territorial control.

We are the only people on Earth asked to guarantee the security of our occupier...while Israel is the only country that calls for defense from its victims.

It is to believed because it is absurd.

In the midst of our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Putin invaded the Republic of Georgia. Let's call it for what it is. Here is Vladimir Putin with a failing Soviet franchise. And when he can't win the hearts and minds of his neighboring nations, he uses energy extortion, masked gunmen and barbed wire.

We're going to take out seven countries in 5 years, starting with Iraq, and then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and, finishing off, Iran.

Greece is a sort of American vassal; the Netherlands is the country of American bases that grow like tulip bulbs; Cuba is the main sugar plantation of the American monopolies; Turkey is prepared to kowtow before any United States proconsul and Canada is the boring second fiddle in the American symphony.

The absurd has meaning only in so far as it is not agreed to.

This is my life now. Absurd, but unpredictable. Not absurd because unpredictable but unpredictable because absurd. If I have lost the meaning of my life, I might still find small treasured things among the spilled and pilfered trash.

Ford... you're turning into a penguin. Stop it.

An independent Ireland would see its own independence in jeopardy the moment it saw the independence of Britain seriously threatened. Mutual self-interest would make the peoples of these two islands, if both independent, the closest possible allies in a moment of real national danger to either.

Whats the worst that could happen?! The worst that could happen is he could cut off your legs and use them to make stilts that look like legs!

The absolute has moved into the fortress of the absurd.