Quotes & Sayings About Corruption

As in everything else, I must start with myself. That is: in all circumstances try to be decent, just, tolerant, and understanding, and at the same time try to resist corruption and deception. In other words, I must do my utmost to act in harmony with my conscience and my better self. — Vaclav Havel

No man, however enslaved to his appetites, or hurried by his passions, can, while he preserves his intellects unimpaired, please himself with promoting the corruption of others. He whose merit has enlarged his influence would surely wish to exert it for the benefit of mankind. Yet such will be the effect of his reputation, while he suffers himself to indulge in any favourite fault, that they who have no hope to reach his excellence will catch at his failings, and his virtues will be cited to justify the copiers of his vices. — Samuel Johnson

For the Word, realizing that in no other way would the corruption of human beings be undone except, simply, by dying, yet being immortal and the Son of the Father of the Word was not able to die, for this reason he takes to himself a body capable of death, in order that it, participating in the Word who is above all, might be sufficient for death on behalf of all, and through the indwelling Word would remain incorruptible, and so corruption might henceforth cease from all by the grace of the resurrection. — Athanasius Of Alexandria

No matter how much evidence we uncover about this case or any others involving Mr. Clinton, millions of Americans simply will not care - they will excuse the corruption because they like Bill Clinton. — Bill O'Reilly

Morality never scratch the back of corruption — Kishore Bansal

Naked power has its limitations, since power is a generator of corruption and corruption in its turn tends to dilute the effectiveness of power. — Robert Payne

if Substance is Life, is the Subject not Death? Insofar as, for Hegel, the basic feature of pre-subjective Life is the "spurious infinity" of the eternal reproduction of the life substance through the incessant movement of the generation and corruption of its elements - that is, the "spurious infinity" of a repetition without progress - the ultimate irony we encounter here is that Freud, who called this excess of death over life the "death drive," conceived it precisely as repetition, as a compulsion to repeat. — Slavoj Zizek

But he alone having reached our deep corruption, he alone having taken upon himself our labors, he alone having suffered the punishments due for our impieties, having recovered us who were not half dead merely, but were already in tombs and sepulchers, and altogether foul and offensive, saves us, both anciently and now, by his beneficent zeal, beyond the expectation of any one, even of ourselves, and imparts liberally of the Father's benefits - he who is the giver of life and light, our great Physician and King and Lord, the Christ of God. — Eusebius

It is unnatural that a pure stream should flow from a foul fountain its vices are but a continuation of the vices of its origin. A man of moral honor and good political principles, cannot submit to the mean drudgery and disgraceful arts, by which such elections are carried. To be a successful candidate, he must be destitute of the qualities that constitute a just legislator: and being thus disciplined to corruption it is not to be expected that the representative should be better than the man. — Thomas Paine

Divinity is the elementary personality of a human being. When he can stand before corruption and win, that is an undivided personality. It is called divinity. — Harbhajan Singh Yogi

Throw in neglect and politicization of the judicial system and you see the result: soaring rates of cocaine trafficking through Venezuela and worsening corruption of institutions. — Rory Carroll

Whatever vices and corruptions men see in the lives of their ministers will not be attributed to the depravity of their old nature which still abides in them, but to the gospel. — John Owen

As people get their opinions so largely from the newspapers they read, the corruption of the schools would not matter so much if the Press were free. But the Press is not free. As it costs at least a quarter of a million of money to establish a daily newspaper in London, the newspapers are owned by rich men. And they depend on the advertisements of other rich men. Editors and journalists who express opinions in print that are opposed to the interests of the rich are dismissed and replaced by subservient ones. — George Bernard Shaw

Instead of politicians, let the monkeys govern the countries; at least they will steal only the bananas! — Mehmet Murat Ildan

In general, corruption tends to exist whenever governments have favors to extend, or something to sell. — Alan Greenspan

Radicals often suspect beauty of corruption. Uptight fuckers though they sometimes are, they're right in one thing: art alone cannot change the world. Pens can't take on swords, let alone Predator drones. But as disappointment and violence spread, the antidote is a generosity that the best art can still inspire.

Art is hope against cynicism, creation against entropy. To make art is an act of both love and defiance. Though I'm a cynic, I believe these things are all we have. — Molly Crabapple

He had spent a lifetime cleansing his mind of poison. He had searched his heart, found the corruption, and removed it. He had torn away the lies - lies he'd been told and had believed, and lies he had devised and used against himself. This was his mastery - the purification of the mind and the recovery of authenticity. This scene symbolized the mastery of death, the awakening. — Miguel Ruiz

The corruption of the American soul is consumerism. — Ben Nicholson

The blood of my motherland waters a magic plant that cures all ills. That plant is art, and sometimes art needs corruption as a kind of fertilizer — Alfred De Musset

Solitude is one thing and being alone is another. Solitude can be isolation, an escape, an unwanted thing; but to be alone without the burden of life, with that utter freedom in which time/thought has never been, is to be with the universe. In solitude there is despairing loneliness, a sense of being abandoned, lost, craving for some kind of relationship, like a ship lost at sea. All our daily activity leads to this isolation, with its endless conflicts and miseries, and rare joys thrown in. This isolation is corruption, manifested in politics, in business and of course in organized religions. Corruption exists in the very high places and on the very doorstep. To be tied is corruption; any form of attachment leads to it, whether it be to a belief, faith, ideal, experience, or any conclusion. — Jiddu Krishnamurti

There's pearl of the orient seas but it happens to be also a pearl of orient corruptions. — Angelica Hopes

These three conceptual and ideological challenges (Hindu fundamentalism, Communist dictatorship and ethnic separatism) all date to the founding of the nation. To these have, more recently been added, three more mundane and materialist challenges. These are inequality, corruption and environmental degradation. — Ramachandra Guha

Love is both wondrous and yet full of peril. Love is a gateway through which hatred - disguised and unrecognized - can pass. — David Gemmell

Remember one thing as South Africa prepares to go to the polls this week and the world grapples with the ascendancy of the African National Congress leader Jacob Zuma: South Africa is not Zimbabwe.
In South Africa, no one doubts that Wednesday's elections will be free and fair. While there is an unacceptable degree of government corruption, there is no evidence of the wholesale kleptocracy of Robert Mugabe's elite. While there has been the abuse of the organs of state by the ruling ANC, there is not the state terror of Mugabe's Zanu-PF. And while there is a clear left bias to Zuma's ANC, there is no suggestion of the kind of voluntarist experimentation that has brought Zimbabwe to its knees. — Mark Gevisser

The abuse of buying and selling votes crept in and
money began to play an important part in determining
elections. Later on, this process of corruption spread to
the law courts. And then to the army, and finally the
Republic was subjected to the rule of emperors — Plutarch

The people are fed up with corruption and embezzlement. They object to censorship. The first thing that the people of Iran want is free elections. — Shirin Ebadi

The state is obliged to fight corruption within the government. — Enrique Pena Nieto

If you saved yourself, you might also save those around you, those you loved. And since you would do anything in the world to save those you loved, you did anything in the world to save yourself. And because there was no choice, equally there was no possibility of avoiding moral corruption. - — Julian Barnes

Like Beji, our country is a nation whose citizens has employed crooked means of survival, lives in the expense of others, cares the least about their compatriots, and are ever more than willing to do anything conceivable to plunge every vulnerable life into a pitch-dark abyss! It is, you will realize, a lovely den of hungry wolves whose ugly claws often extend a cold handshake to every beggar in the next turn... — Levi Cheruo Cheptora

Since Deacon Hollingshead's arrival in town last July the Dominion had been hard at work, cleansing New York City of moral corruption. "Corruption" is a popular word with the enthusiasts of the Dominion, usually uttered as a prelude to the knife, the docket, or the noose. — Robert Charles Wilson

Some words we use all the time are difficult to define when we actually have to think about them. We use the word "evil" all the time but when asked to define what we are talking about, it can be quite difficult.

Think about evil as you would think of counterfeit currency. A counterfeit is the corruption of something real. You can have real currency without the existence of any counterfeits. You cannot, however, have counterfeits without the real thing existing first. Evil is dependent on the existence of goodness but goodness is not dependent on evil. Goodness was there first. It is an absolute. Evil must always be thought of in relationship with absolute goodness. — Jon Morrison

I discovered that all these rulers were men. What they had in common was an avaricious and distorted personality, a never-ending appetite for money, sex and unlimited power. They were men who sowed corruption on the earth, and plundered their peoples, men endowed with loud voices, a capacity for persuasion, for choosing sweet words and shooting poisoned arrows. Thus, the truth about them was revealed only after their death, and as a result I discovered that history tended to repeat itself with a foolish obstinacy. — Nawal El Saadawi

And (HAMAS) instead offered alternative ideas on how to both confront Israel without surrendering and govern the Palestinians without corruption. — Khaled Hroub

As every slumdweller knew, there were three main ways out of poverty: finding an entrepreneurial niche, as the Husains had found in garbage; politics and corruption, in which Asha placed her hopes; and education. — Katherine Boo

This world is very good as if we do good deeds then we will get its fruits. World is bitter for those who are live their life with corruption or sins. — Rahman Baba

All Earthquakes and Disasters are warnings; there's too much corruption in the world — Aristotle.

Time was to sin and to enjoy, time was to scoff at God and at the warnings of His holy church, time was to defy His majesty, to disobey His commands, to hoodwink one's fellow men, to commit sin after sin and to hide one's corruption from the sight of men. — James Joyce

Achievement of any kind is the crown of effort,the diadem of thought.By the aid of self-control, resolution, purity, righteousness, and well-directed thought a man ascends.By the aid of animality,indolence,impurity,corruption,and confusion of thought a man descends. — James Allen

The only decent daily paper of record in France is the online 'Mediapart,' which exposes graft and corruption in high places and is feared by the establishment. — Tariq Ali

There has been corruption in the Belgian civil service and at government level for decades. The Royal family do what they can to hold things together, and they don't do a bad job. — Nicholas Royle

We establish no religion in this country, nor will we ever. But we poison our society when we remove its theological underpinnings. We court corruption when we leave society devoid of belief. — Jeff Miller

As for corruption, who's more corrupt - the seller or the buyer? And how corrupt does a society have to be when its citizens need to get high to escape their reality, at the cost of bloodshed and suffering of their neighbors? — Don Winslow

In Egypt the neoliberal programs have meant statistical growth, like right before the Arab Spring, Egypt was a kind of poster child for the World Bank and the IMF [International Monetary Fund:] the marvelous economic management and great reform. The only problem was for most of the population it was a kind of like a blow in the solar plexus: wages going down, benefits being eliminated, subsidized food gone and meanwhile, high concentration of wealth and a huge amount of corruption. — Noam Chomsky

What saddens me is the corruption of youth and beauty, and the loss of soul, which is only replaced by money. — Lisa Bonet

Have you ever found yourself saying, "There ought to be a law against this," or, "Somebody should do something"? Well, here's the good news - you can be the one to do something. You can be the one to make the law. — Victoria Stoklasa MA

We start out in identical perfection: bright, reflective, full of sun. The accident of our lives bruises us into dirty individuality. We meet with grief. Our character dulls and tarnishes. We meet with guilt. We know, we know: the price of living is corruption. There isn't as much light as there once was. In the grave we lapse back into undifferentiated sameness — Gregory Maguire

Not just charity, even corruption begins at home. — K. Hari Kumar

The devil himself can become beauty, so we are told, to corrupt mankind.
(Marco) — Iain Pears

There is an interesting interplay between power corrupting and corruption empowering. The causality does not go one way. — Bruce Bueno De Mesquita

Human beings are fallible, frightened and prone to corruption. — Robert K. Tanenbaum

That the hand of God was involved in the birth of the new nation he had no doubt. "It is the will of heaven that the two countries should be sundered forever." If the people now were to have "unbounded power," and as the people were quite capable of corruption as "the great," and thus high risks were involved, he would submit all his hopes and fears to an overruling providence, "in which unfashionable as the faith may be, I firmly believe. — David McCullough

A group of politicians deciding to dump a President because his morals are bad is like the Mafia getting together to bump off the Godfather for not going to church on Sunday. — Russell Baker

The kind of corruption the media talk about, the kind the Supreme Court was concerned about, involves the putative sale of votes in exchange for campaign contributions. — James L. Buckley

Should I pity so and so?" I asked. I gave his name but he delights so in giving it himself that I feel there is no need to give it for him.
"No. He's vicious. He's a corrupter and he's truly vicious."
"But he's supposed to be a good writer."
"He's not," she said. "He's just a showman and he corrupts for the pleasure of corruption and he leads people into other vicious practices as well. — Ernest Hemingway,

This is a matter of public health. The public was sick and tired of DeLay and his corruption. — Jim Hightower

Contracting corruption has been around since the construction of the Appian Way. — Matt Taibbi

To centralize power in the name of freedom is akin to putting a crime syndicate in charge of rooting out corruption. It is the normal state of politics that the more centralized it is, the more damage it does. Fast-track authority [for government-to-government trade agreements] centralizes power and is therefore part of the problem. — Llewellyn Rockwell

To me, my husband was my son's murderer. He was also my daughter's molester. A parasite nibbling on the Holy Book, he was Lucifer, holding me by the throat and driving me to sin every night. He was Bhai's destroyer, Amma Sain's tormentor, Ma's humbler and the people's exploiter. He was the rapist of orphans and the fiend that fed on the weak. But over and above all this, he was known to be the man closest to Allah, the one who could reach Him and save us. — Tehmina Durrani

She understood at least as well as I did what corruption and pitiless cruelty might be hidden behind the masks that some people wore. - Addison Goodheart pg 93 — Dean Koontz

The time to guard against corruption and tyranny is before they shall have gotten hold of us. It is better to keep the wolf out of the fold, than to trust to drawing his teeth and talons after he shall have entered. — Thomas Jefferson

But American statesmen have studied the constitutions of other states more than that of their own, and have succeeded in obscuring the American system in the minds of the people, and giving them in its place pure and simple democracy, which is its false development or corruption. Under the influence of this false development, the people were fast losing sight of the political truth that, though the people are sovereign, it is the organic, not the inorganic people, the territorial people, not the people as simple population, and were beginning to assert the absolute God-given right of the majority to govern. All the changes made in the bosom of the States themselves have consisted in removing all obstacles to the irresponsible will of the majority, leaving minorities and individuals at their mercy. This tendency to a centralized democracy had more to do with provoking secession and rebellion than the anti-slavery sentiments of the Northern, Central, and Western States. — Orestes Augustus Brownson

All institutions are prone to corruption and to the vices of their members. — Morris West

Corruption never has been compulsory. — Anthony Eden

That by 1774 the final crisis of the constitution, brought on by political and social corruption, had been reached was, to most informed colonists, evident; ... — Bernard Bailyn

At length corruption, like a general flood (So long by watchful ministers withstood), Shall deluge all; and avarice, creeping on, Spread like a low-born mist, and blot the sun. — Alexander Pope

Technology transforms people's lives. From mitigating poverty to simplifying processes, ending corruption to providing better services, Technology is omnipresent. It has become the single-most important instrument of human progress. — Narendra Modi

The whole of the Targum deserves study as shewing how textual ambiguity or corruption may combine with doctrinal prepossession to modify tradition;
Chapter II, Section 2, Paragraph 1171 — Edwin A. Abbott

Either cry for exchanging new currency notes for couple of days or crib for corruption for ages and generations with old one. Choice is yours. — Vikrmn

You don't say 'they all do it' unless you know you've been doing it too. — Christopher Hitchens

For he alone, as the only all-gracious Son of an all-gracious Father, in accordance with the purpose of his Father's benevolence, has willingly put on the nature of us who lay prostrate in corruption, and like some excellent physician, who for the sake of saving them that are ill, examines their sufferings, handles their foul sores, and reaps pain for himself from the miseries of another, so us who were not only diseased and afflicted with terrible ulcers and wounds already mortified, but were even lying among the dead, he has saved for himself from the very jaws of death. For none other of those in heaven had such power as without harm to minister to the salvation of so many. — Eusebius

Frequent mobs, seditions, and at last civil wars, became common, while a few leading men on whom the masses were dependent, affected supreme power under the seemly pretence of seeking the good of senate and people; citizens were judged good or bad, without reference to their loyalty to the republic (for all were equally corrupt); but the wealthy and dangerously powerful were esteemed good citizens, because they maintained the existing state of things. — Sallust

Our country is too large to have all its affairs directed by a single government. Public servants at such a distance, and from under the eye of their constituents, must, from the circumstance of distance, be unable to administer and overlook all the details necessary for the good government of the citizens; and the same circumstance, by rendering detection impossible to their constituents, will invite public agents to corruption, plunder and waste. — Thomas Jefferson

People who are tired of K Street corruption and Wall Street greed are ready for Main Street Values. — Mike Huckabee

From the earliest ages of history to the present day there have never been thirteen millions of people associated in one political body who enjoyed so much freedom and happiness as the people of these United States. You have no longer any cause to fear dangers from abroad ... It is from within, among yourselves - from cupidity, from corruption, from disappointed ambition and inordinate thirst for power - that factions will be formed and liberty endangered ... — Andrew Jackson

If a country is to be corruption free and become a nation of beautiful minds, I strongly feel there are three key societal members who can make a difference. They are the father, the mother and the teacher. — A. P. J. Abdul Kalam

I should be inclined, therefore, as I have hinted before, to consider the world and this life as the mighty process of God, not for the trial, but for the creation and formation of mind, a process necessary to awaken inert, chaotic matter into spirit, to sublimate the dust of the earth into soul, to elicit an ethereal spark from the clod of clay. And in this view of the subject, the various impressions and excitements which man receives through life may be considered as the forming hand of his Creator, acting by general laws, and awakening his sluggish existence, by the animating touches of the Divinity, into a capacity of superior enjoyment. The original sin of man is the torpor and corruption of the chaotic matter in which he may be said to be born. — Thomas Robert Malthus

Electra Heart is the antithesis of everything I stand for. And the point of introducing her and building a concept around her is that she stands for the corrupt side of American ideology, and basically that's the corruption of yourself. My worst fear - that's anyone's worst fear - is to lose myself and become an empty person. And that happens a lot when you're very ambitious. — Marina And The Diamonds

People say that the monetary system produces incentive. This may be true in limited areas, but it also produces greed, embezzlement, corruption, pollution, jealousy, anger, crime, war, poverty, tremendous scarcity, and unnecessary human suffering. You have to look at the entire picture. — Jacque Fresco

Henry Lloyd was with Darrow when they toured the mine. It was a dreadful experience, Lloyd said, "like a foretaste of the inferno."

"You might as well get used to it," Darrow told him. Heaven was reserved for Wall Street financiers. Infidels like themselves would be rooming with Satan. — John A. Farrell

As a consequence, the Court ruled that the limits on campaign spending violated the First Amendment, but it accepted the $1,000 limit on individual contributions on the ground that the need to avoid the appearance of corruption justified this limited constraint on speech. — James L. Buckley

This is the kind of corruption we understand, the corruption of the petty clerk writ large, and so this is the kind of corruption we look for. This is the kind of guilt we expect and understand: personal, targeted, involving suitcases. We really need suitcases. — Mihir S. Sharma

Jonathan is one of the most corrupt Nigerians I ever investigated while at EFCC & his level of corruption even as deputy governor is just disturbing. PDP is just a disaster and a total failure. Change is the only panacea. — Nuhu Ribadu

Men of factious tempers, of local prejudices, or of sinister designs, may, by intrigue, by corruption, or by other means, first obtain the suffrages, and then betray the interests, of the people. — Alexander Hamilton

You would be surprised at how many corporations "none of your business" applies to! — Steven Magee

Political corruption, social greed, and Americanized quasi-socialism can ruin even the most wonderful places. California proved that. — Tiffany Madison

When people lose faith in the natural goodness of the human character, the lack of trust in spiritual goodness, that is one reason why corruption has become so widespread today. — Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

Lying and corruption begins to seep into the emotional zeitgeist of the entire country. If individual and institutional "leaders" are not exposed, confronted, and prosecuted or ousted for their misdeeds, the inevitable result of all this bureaucratic, corporate, and government corruption will be full-scale cultural suicide in the form of mass amorality - behavior without any moral guidelines - which can generate social chaos in a historically moral country, which can next generate restoration of "order" by way of martial law, which can then generate full dictatorship. More: — Alexandra York

Yet, even allowing for these failings, was not St John Clarke still a person more like myself than anyone else sitting round the table? That was a sobering thought. He, too, for longer years, had existed in the imagination, even though this imagination led him (in my eyes) to a world ludicrously contrived, socially misleading, professionally nauseous. On top of that, had he not on this earlier occasion gone out of his way to speak a word of carefully hedged praise for my own work? Was that, therefore, an aspect of his critical faculty for which he should be given credit, or was it an even stronger reason for guarding against the possibility of corruption at the hands of one whose own writings could not be approved? — Anthony Powell

You have a morbid aversion to dying. You probably resent the fact that you're at war and might get your head blown off any second."
"I more than resent it, sir. I'm absolutely incensed."
"You have deep-seated survival anxieties. And you don't like bigots, bullies, snobs, or hypocrites. Subconsciously there are many people you hate."
"Consciously, sir, consciously," Yossarian corrected in an effort to help. "I hate them consciously."
"You're antagonistic to the idea of being robbed, exploited, degraded, humiliated, or deceived. Misery depresses you. Ignorance depresses you. Persecution depresses you. Violence depresses you. Corruption depresses you. You know, it wouldn't surprise me if you're a manic-depressive!"
"Yes, sir. Perhaps I am."
"Don't try to deny it."
"I'm not denying it, sir," said Yossarian, pleased with the miraculous rapport that finally existed between them. "I agree with all you've said. — Joseph Heller

Fear is the devil's most powerful tool because he can't always convince a good man to do wrong, but he can paralyze his will with fright, keeping a good man from doing what is right. It eventually results in the same end. — Richelle E. Goodrich

We should be unfaithful to ourselves if we should ever lose sight of the danger to our Liberties if anything partial or extraneous should infect the purity of our free, fair, virtuous, and independent elections. If an election is to be determined by a majority of a single vote, and that can be procured by a party through artifice or corruption, the Government may be the choice of a party for its own ends, not of the nation for the national good. — John Adams

The humble sinner will sometimes be interpreted as one of the filthiest in the eyes of man yet immersed in the eyes of God, and this is due to the volition of honesty regarding his own corruption. — Criss Jami

Instead of Passover pointing backward to the great sacrifice by which God had rescued his people from slavery in Egypt, this meal pointed forward to the great sacrifice by which God was to rescue his people from their ultimate slavery, from death itself and all that contributed to it (evil, corruption, and sin). This would be the real Exodus, the real "return from exile." This would be the establishment of the "new covenant" spoken of by Jeremiah (31:31). This would be the means by which "sins would be forgiven" - in other words, the means by which God would deal with the sin that had caused Israel's exile and shame and, beyond that, the sin because of which the whole world was under the power of death. — N. T. Wright

No matter what corruption he's taught about the virtue of selflessness, sex is the most profoundly selfish of all acts, an act which he cannot perform for any motive but his own enjoyment - just try to think of performing it in a spirit of selfless charity?-an act which is not possible in self-abasement, only in self-exaltation, only in the confidence of being desired and being worthy of desire. It is an act that forces him to stand naked in spirit, as well as in body, and to accept his real ego as his standard of value. — Ayn Rand

I think being condemned to death is the only real distinction," said Mathilde. "It is the only thing which cannot be bought. — Stendhal

Corruption free" will truly be in a future impossible tense because many people re-elect unscrupulous politicians!
In the end because of blind immunity to reality and impunity of "justified" corruptions in the government, it is always the hard working, suffering, struggling, less privileged citizens who are all the sacrificial lamb in times of disaster and calamities through their well catered embezzlement system. — Angelica Hopes

I believe we have a deficit of moral courage in the United States Congress. We have many learned individuals who know what is right but have not the courage to stand against the moral corruption that is now attempting to undermine our republic. — Tom A. Coburn

And, because in some hard core of me, in some stubborn trench of selfish refusal, I could not, even at ten years of age, surrender to anything or anyone, I fought that pain. I analysed its offensive, and found its lines of attack. It festered, like the corruption in a wound turned sour, drawing strength from me. I knew enough to know the remedy. Hot iron for infection, cauterize, burn, make it pure. I cut from myself all the weakness of care. The love for my dead, I put aside, secure in a casket, an object of study, a dry exhibit, no longer bleeding, cut loose, set free. The capacity for new love, I burned out. I watered it with acid until the ground lay barren and nothing there would sprout, no flower take root. — Mark Lawrence

Rather to my surprise, I found myself genuinely indignant at the suggestion that murder was to be reintroduced as a means of political advancement for the first time since the Tudors, and even more indignant that the legal and political establishments in all their forms - which included, at that stage, the police - were going to cover up the whole episode. In the event, it turned out that my anxieties were unfounded, as Thorpe was totally innocent of all charges brought against him. — Auberon Waugh

It is no coincidence that as the Supreme Court has been removing the last constraints on the legalized corruption of politicians, the American standard of living has been falling at the fastest rate in decades. — Mike Lofgren