Systemic Inertia Quotes

The Founding Fathers: A bunch of old white guys who are making it nearly impossible for modern government to pick our doctors, teach our children, correct our diets, and save our money.

My sense was that most of the elected officials in Washington - in their heart of hearts - really believe that the system can't be too bad because it produced them. And when people in power can stay in power they do very little to tinker with the apparatus that put them in power. We've seen it time after time after time.

Unfortunately, we are finding the bureaucratic inefficiencies and red tape have a tendency to slow the efforts of individuals and communities working to rebuild.

There's a big gap between public opinion polls and the vote in Washington, in Congress. The majority consciousness has changed, and often that has made very clear, practical changes in our daily lives, but the centers of power are still not occupied, for the most part, by this new consciousness.

For more than a hundred years much complaint has been made of the unmethodical way in which schools are conducted, but it is only within the last thirty that any serious attempt has been made to find a remedy for this state of things. And with what result? Schools remain exactly as they were.

The system concedes nothing without demand, for it formulates its very method of operation on the basis that the ignorant will learn to know, the child will grow into an adult and therefore demands will begin to be made. It gears itself to resist demands in whatever way it sees fit.

The problem is that every single person here was elected under this system. It is not typical of human nature to change what works.

Efforts to reform are often met with resistance because the system always tries to fall back to the status quo and what is comfortable.

The politicians already in office don't want to change. A few might have it in their hearts to change and to start working for the people, but even some of the most progressive politicians are silent because they know that the candidate with the most money wins.

Things remain the same because it is impossible to change very much without changing most of everything.

Parliamentary democracy is, in truth, little more than a means of securing a periodical change in the management team, which is then allowed to preside over a system that remains in essence intact. If the British people were ever to ask themselves what power they truly enjoyed under our political system they would be amazed to discover how little it is

I want you to learn nothing from government. This place is dead intellectually. It does not produce any ideas; it is all about turf battles and checking the box. Your job is to break through all this.

No matter who you vote for, the government stays in power

Established systems are inherently hostile to change.

The world has changed but our school systems haven't.

Changing leaders is pointless if the same policies are pursued.

We ourselves are imbued with urgency, yet the message of our society is' that there is no viable alternative to the present.

In existing States a fresh law is looked upon as a remedy for evil. Instead of themselves altering what is bad, people begin by demanding a law to alter it.

Government officials tend to become an obstacle when you try to do something new.

A revolution is generally only evolution--an explosive sequence of events crowded into a short space of time, but leaving more of the ancient regime untouched than usually is at first apparent.

Entrenched bureaucracies are always opposed to fundamental changes.