If voting made any difference they wouldn't let us do it.
They wrongly believe that good intentions move mountains. Bulldozers move mountains. But there are exceptions.
At the federal level, as a member of Congress, you have one vote out of 435, and in the Senate, it's one out of 100. So, the ability to get some stuff done exists as a much larger opportunity at a local level than in the federal government.
As a liberal, I am morally obligated to be pragmatic. What good do I do poor people, elderly people, people who are being discriminated against because of their sexual orientation if I'm not realistic about accomplishing something.
To sit home, read one's favorite paper, and scoff at the misdeeds of the men who do things is easy, but it is markedly ineffective. It is what evil men count upon the good men's doing.
It's very nice to be a rebel saying, 'I stand on my principles,' but if in fact that's not going to have any impact on the policy, it may be principled, but it doesn't deliver the better outcome that the country needs.
I like the House. The House is where you can effect the most change. It's such a fast-moving dynamic body compared to the Senate.
Songs won't save the planet, but neither will books or speeches.
Even voting for the right is doing nothing for it. It is only expressing to men feebly your desire that it should prevail. A wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance, nor wish it to prevail through the power of the majority. There is but little virtue in the action of masses of men.
Non-violence is a very powerful weapon. Most people don't understand the power of non-violence and tend to be amazed by the whole idea. Those who have been involved in bringing about change and see the difference between violence and non-violence are firmly committed to a lifetime of non-violence, not because it is easy or because it is cowardly, but because it is an effective and very powerful way.
Plasticene and self-expression will not solve the problems of education. Nor will technology and vocational guidance; nor the classics and the Hundred Best Books.
I just don't believe that you have to come in and insult people when you want to change things.
In politics, demonstration not description is the name of the game.
Nothing that is totally voluntary that is painful, ever works.
Knowing how to deal with change effectively is a primary requirement for living successfully in perhaps the most exciting time in all of human history
There's only so much I can do to effect change - and really, the thing that I can do that's most effective is to work and to do good work. That, I feel, is speaking out in its own way.
I have the experience we need to make the changes we want and I think that's a winning case.
I have seen how effective language attached to policies that are mainstream and delivered by people who are passionate and effective can change the course of history.
I don't go around lecturing people and telling them they shouldn't eat meat. I just don't think that's terribly effective. I just try to tell people how I have personally benefitted from the vegan lifestyle.
We have become frighteningly effective at altering nature.
The people of a nation are enslaved when, together, they are helpless to institute effective change, when the people serve the government more than the government serves them.
… law by itself can only address the symptoms, but education can reach deep into our heart, which is far more effective to set the society on the right course. So, education is the fundamental solution.
We immediately become more effective when we decide to change ourselves rather than asking things to change for us.
People are not going to change because an activist goes around shouting.
Not only is it possible to do lean startup in federal government, but it's the most effective way to drive change in the federal government.
