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War Is, In Some Not Yet Entirely Defined Sense, A Self-replicating Pattern Of Behavior, Possessed Of A Dynamism Not Unlike That Of Living Things.
-Barbara Ehrenreich
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War Is, In Some

Barbara Ehrenreich
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War Is, In Some Not Yet Entirely Defined Sense, A Self-replicating Pattern Of Behavior, Possessed Of A Dynamism Not Unlike That Of Living Things.

Understanding the Quote: "war is, in some not yet entirely defined sense, a self-replicating pattern..."

This quote by Barbara Ehrenreich reflects deeply on the theme of war. It connects to the universal human journey of purpose, motivation, and reflection. Often categorized under War, Self, Patterns, the quote offers insight, emotional clarity, and intellectual inspiration to readers worldwide.

Whether you’re a student exploring new ideas, a leader trying to motivate your team, or someone seeking direction in life — this quote provides value. It resonates because it’s more than words — it’s a bridge between experience and wisdom. It shows how Barbara Ehrenreich interprets life's core challenges and triumphs.

Lessons From the Quote

This quote teaches resilience and focus. It reminds readers that no matter where they stand in life, reflection and self-awareness lead to growth. Each word has meaning, and when studied, it becomes clear how impactful thoughtful language can be.

About Barbara Ehrenreich

Barbara Ehrenreich is celebrated for insightful thoughts on war and self. Their legacy lives on through writings that guide, comfort, and inspire. Discover more on their profile page.

Actionable Takeaways

  • Reflect on how this quote applies to your current life path.
  • Share the message with someone who needs inspiration.
  • Write your thoughts on this quote in a journal or blog post.
  • Use it as a daily affirmation or reminder.

Closing Thoughts

Quotes like this endure because they capture universal truths. They comfort us in solitude and empower us in groups. Carry this quote forward — live by its wisdom, share its message, and keep its essence alive.

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Topic
War
Self
Patterns
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Like Many Other Women, I Could Not Understand Why Every Man Who Changed A Diaper Has Felt Impelled, In Recent Years, To Write A Book About It.
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Call It 'nationalism' When You Affix A Flag To Your Car, And Leave The Word 'patriotism' For Your Efforts To Make This Country A Kinder, More Egalitarian Place, And One That Is Less Dangerous To The Rest Of The World.
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Roman Catholicism: A Hundred Million People Bowing Down Before A Flesh-hating, Elderly Celibate.
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If That's How It All Started, Then We Might As Well Face The Fact That What's Left Out There Is A Great Deal Of Shrapnel And A Whole Bunch Of Cinders (one Of Which Is, Fortunately, Still Hot Enough And Close Enough To Be Good For Tanning). Trying To Find Some Sense And Order In This Mess May Be As Futile As Trying To ... Reconstruct The Economy Of Iowa From A Bowl Of Popcorn. [on Searching For Evidence Of The Big Bang.]
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For The Millions Of Us Who Live Glued To Computer Keyboards At Work And Tv Monitors At Home, Food May Be More Than Entertainment. It May Be The Only Sensual Experience Left.
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Well, The First Thing That Clued Me In To The Fact That There Was Something Really Scary About Breast Cancer, Way Beyond The Thought Of Dying, Was Coming Across An Ad In The Newspaper For Pink Breast Cancer Teddy Bears. I Am Not That Afraid Of Dying, But I Am Terrified Of Dying With A Pink Teddy Bear Under My Arm.
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So Even Though I Consider Myself A Fairly Upbeat Person, Energetic And Things Like That, I Never Do Very Well On Happiness Tests.
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If You Can Attribute Your Success Entirely To Your Own Mental Effort, To Your Own Attitude, To Some Spiritual Essence That You Have That Is Better Than Other Peoples, Then That Must Feel Pretty Good.
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We Need To Brace Ourselves For A Struggle Against Terrifying Obstacles...bot H Of Our Own Making And Imposed By The Natural World. And The First Step Is To Recover From The Mass Delusion That Is Positive Thinking.
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I Think It's Tragic That We Have This Human Capacity, Which Appears To Be Hardwired, Or So The Evolutionary Biologists Say, For Collective Joy. We Have These Techniques For Generating It That Go Back Thousands Of Years, And Yet We Tend Not To Use This.
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As A General Rule, When Something Gets Elevated To Apple-pie Status In The Hierarchy Of American Values, You Have To Suspect That Its Actual Monetary Value Is Skidding Toward Zero. Take Motherhood: Nobody Ever Thought Of Putting It On A Moral Pedestal Until Some Brash Feminists Pointed Out, About A Century Ago, That The Pay Is Lousy And The Career Ladder Nonexistent. Same Thing With Work: Would We Be So Reverent About The 'work Ethic' If It Wasn't For The Fact That The Average Working Stiff's Hourly Pay Is Shrinking, Year By Year.
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The Label Of Liberalism Is Hardly A Sentence To Public Ignominy: Otherwise Bruce Springsteen Would Still Be Rehabilitating Used Cadillacs In Asbury Park And Jane Fonda, For All We Know, Would Be Just Another Overweight Housewife.
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The Money That Fueled The Explosion Of Gluttony At The Top Had To Come From Somewhere Or, More Specifically, From Someone. Since No Domestic Oil Deposits Had Been Discovered, No New Seams Of Uranium Or Gold, And Since The War In Iraq Enriched Only The Military Contractors And Suppliers, It Had To Come From Other Americans.
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Every Time A Bank Swoops Down To Snatch Up A Home, It Should Be Met With A Crowd Of Jeering, Obstructive Neighbors. And Although This May Be Point 4.5, How About Organizing A Mass Refusal To Pay Back Student Loans?
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Matter
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New York
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Wine
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Taken
Character
I'm Not A Nice Person.
Nice
Nice Person
Persons
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Drug
Hug
Stopping
... There Hasn't Been A Serious Life-style Trend Since The Couch Potato Was Sighted, In About 1986, On One Of Its Rare Forays To The Video Store. Cocooning Remains A Significant Mass Enterprise, Encouraged By The Availability Of Five Hundred New Cable Channels And Microwavable Popcorn.
Availability
Style
Popcorn
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Gone Away
Ideas
Long
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War
Warrior
Endless
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Class
America
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Men
Play
Trying
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Opposites
People
Exercise Is The Yuppie Version Of Bulimia.
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Exercise
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Circles
Dancing
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Results
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Class
America
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Civilization
Numbers
Nurse
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Powerful
Giving
Care
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Country
Writing
Native American
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War
America
Madness
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People
Doe
Watches
We Are Reaching The Point, If We Have Not Passed It Already, Where The Largest Public Housing Program In America Will Be Our Penitentiary System.
America
Prison
Program
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Technology
Issues
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Children
Friendly
Our Lives
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I Grew Up Hearing Over And Over, To The Point Of Tedium, That "hard Work" Was The Secret Of Success: "work Hard And You'll Get Ahead" Or "it's Hard Work That Got Us Where We Are." No One Ever Said That You Could Work Hard - Harder Even Than You Ever Thought Possible - And Still Find Yourself Sinking Ever Deeper Into Poverty And Debt.
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Finding Yourself
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Police
Poverty
The Less Sophisticated Of My Forbears Avoided Foreigners At All Costs, For The Very Good Reason That, In Their Circles, Speaking In Tongues Was Commonly A Prelude To Snake Handling. The More Tolerant Among Us Regarded Foreign Languages As A Kind Of Speech Impediment That Could Be Overcome By Willpower.
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Circles
Overcoming
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Endure
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Order
Negativity
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War
Distance
Class
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Realizing
Hours
Selling
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Our Society
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Women
Feminism
James Bond In His Sean Connery Days ... Was The First Well-known Bachelor On The American Scene Who Was Not A Drifter Or A Degenerate And Did Not Eat Out Of Cans.
Firsts
Degenerates
Well Known
The Feminist Anti-pornography Movement, No Less Than The Feminist Movement Of A Century Ago, Encourages The Assumption That Male And Female Sexuality, And Possibly Morality, Are As Unlike As Yin And Yang.
Feminist
Feminism
Males
No Culture On Earth Outside Of Mid-century Suburban America Has Ever Deployed One Woman Per Child Without Simultaneously Assigning Her Such Major Productive Activities As Weaving, Farming, Gathering, Temple Maintenance, And Tent-building. The Reason Is That Full-time, One-on-one Child-raising Is Not Good For Women Or Children.
Mother
Children
America
Cheerfulness, Up To And Including Delusion And False Hope, Has A Recognized Place In Medicine.
Pain
Medicine
False Hope
From The Point Of View Of The Pharmaceutical Industry, The Aids Problem Has Already Been Solved. After All, We Already Have A Drug Which Can Be Sold At The Incredible Price Of $8,000 An Annual Dose, And Which Has The Added Virtue Of Not Diminishing The Market By Actually Curing Anyone.
Views
Alcohol
Drug
An Asteroid Could Hit Us At Any Moment. This Is Not - And Also, The Most Successful Kind Of Life On This Planet Is Not Us, It's Microbes. They're The Ones Who Greatly Outnumber Us, And May Eventually Destroy Us.
Successful
May
Asteroids
Ineluctably, The Insults Inflicted In One War Call Forth New Wars Of Retaliation, Which May Be Waged Within Months Of The Original Conflict Or Generations Later.
War
Generations
May
Poverty Is Not A Character Failing Or A Lack Of Motivation. Poverty Is A Shortage Of Money.
Motivation
Character
Poverty
I Was Raised The Old-fashioned Way, With A Stern Set Of Moral Principles: Never Lie, Cheat, Steal Or Knowingly Spread A Venereal Disease. Never Speed Up To Hit A Pedestrian Or, Or Course, Stop To Kick A Pedestrian Who Has Already Been Hit. From Which It Followed, Of Course, That One Would Never Ever -- On Pain Of Deletion From Dozens Of Christmas Card Lists Across The Country -- Vote Republican.
Country
Pain
Lying
Yes, I Think Especially The Pentecostal Churches, You Know, That There's Been Such A Growth In Pentecostalism. And It's A Rejection Of The Much More Dour And Barren Kind Of Calvinist Worship And Also, The Very Formal Catholic Forms Of Worship.
Thinking
Rejection
Catholic
There Is The Fear, Common To All English-only Speakers, That The Chief Purpose Of Foreign Languages Is To Make Fun Of Us. Otherwise, You Know, Why Not Just Come Out And Say It?
Fun
Purpose
Why Not
The War With Iraq ... Had To Be One Of The Greatest Non Sequiturs In Military History. Attacked By A Gang Composed Largely Of Islamic Militants From Saudi Arabia, The United States Countered By Invading An Unrelated Country, And One Of The Most Secular In The Middle East At That.
Country
Military
War
The Question Is Why One Should Be So Inwardly Preoccupied At All. Why Not Reach Out To Others In Love And Solidarity Or Peer Into The Natural World For Some Glimmer Of Understanding? Why Retreat Into Anxious Introspection When, As Emerson Might Have Said, There Is A Vast World Outside To Explore? Why Spend So Much Time Working On Oneself When There Is So Much Real Work To Be Done?
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Understanding
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Children
Positive Thinking
College
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Snakes
Long
Yards
Marriage Probably Originated As A Straightforward Food-for-sex Deal Among Foraging Primates. Compatibility Was Not A Big Issue, Nor, Of Course, Was There Any Tension Over Who Would Control The Remote.
Sex
Issues
Foraging
Given The Cultural Barriers To Intersex Conversation, The Amazing Thing Is That We Would Even Expect Women And Men To Have Anything To Say To Each Other For More Than Ten Minutes At A Stretch.
Men
Minutes
Conversation
A Cynic Might Conclude That The Real Purpose Of The $500 Million-a-year Implant Business Is The Implantation Of Fat In The Bellies And Rumps Of Underemployed Plastic Surgeons.
Real
Years
Purpose
The One Regret I Have About My Own Abortions Is That They Cost Money That Might Otherwise Have Been Spent On Something More Pleasurable, Like Taking The Kids To Movies And Theme Parks.
Regret
Kids
Abortion
Labor Is Like Motherhood To Most Of Our Political Leaders: A Calling So Fine And Noble That It Would Be Sullied By Talk Of Vulgar, Mundane Things Like Pay.
Work
Motherhood
Leader
At Best The Family Teaches The Finest Things Human Beings Can Learn From One Another Generosity And Love. But It Is Also, All Too Often, Where We Learn Nasty Things Like Hate, Rage And Shame.
Love
Hate
Generosity
The Truth Is, Many Things Are Worth Doing Only In The Most Slovenly, Halfhearted Fashion Possible, And Many Other Things Are Not Worth Doing At All.
Fashion
Truth Is
A Great Deal Of The Wealth At The Top Is Built On The Low-wage Labor Of The Poor. Take Wal-mart, Our Largest Private Employer And Premiere Exploiter Of The Working Class. ... You Think It's A Coincidence That This Union-busting Low-wage Retail Empire Happens To Have Generated A $65 Billion Family Fortune?
Thinking
Class
Retail
Anyone Who Has Invented A Better Mousetrap, Or The Contemporary Equivalent, Can Expect To Be Harassed By Strangers Demanding That You Read Their Unpublished Manuscripts Or Undergo The Humiliation Of Public Speaking, Usually On Remote Midwestern Campuses.
Innovation
Stranger
Public Speaking
Marriage Is Socialism Among Two People.
Marriage
Eugenics
Two
For Anyone Worn Down, The Impossible Will Take A Little While Is A Bracing Double Cappuccino.
Littles
Impossible
Cappuccino
I Realize That After Decades Of Positive Thinking The Notion Of Realism, Of Things As They Are, May Seem A Little Quaint. ... When The Stakes Are High Enough And The Risks Obvious, We Still Turn To People Who Can Be Counted On To Understand Those Risks And Prepare For Worst-case Scenarios. A Chief Of State Does Not Want To Hear A General In The Field Say That He 'hopes' To Win Tomorrow's Battle Or That He's 'visualizing Victory'.
Positive Thinking
Winning
Reality
War Is, In Some Not Yet Entirely Defined Sense, A Self-replicating Pattern Of Behavior, Possessed Of A Dynamism Not Unlike That Of Living Things.
War
Self
Patterns
Of All The Nasty Outcomes Predicted For Women's Liberation... None Was More Alarming, From A Feminist Point Of View, Than The Suggestion That Women Would Eventually Become Just Like Men.
Men
Views
Feminist
A Lot Of What We Experience As Strength Comes From Knowing What To Do With Weakness. Nickel And Dimed On (not) Getting By In America
Knowing
America
Weakness
Take Motherhood: Nobody Ever Thought Of Putting It On A Moral Pedestal Until Some Brash Feminists Pointed Out, About A Century Ago, That The Pay Is Lousy And The Career Ladder Nonexistent.
Mother
Humorous
Careers
When Television Families Aren't Gathered Around The Kitchen Table Exchanging Wisecracks, They Are Experiencing Brief But Moving Dilemmas, Which Are Handily Solved By The Youngest Child Or By Some Cute Extraterrestrial Houseguest. Emerging From Family Ties Or My Two Dads, We Are Forced To Acknowledge That Our Own Families Are Made Up Of Slow-witted, Emotionally Crippled People Who Would Be Lucky To Qualify For Seats In The Studio Audience Of Jeopardy!
Cute
Children
Dad
That's Free Enterprise, Friends: Freedom To Gamble, Freedom To Lose. And The Great Thing - The Truly Democratic Thing About It - Is That You Don't Even Have To Be A Player To Lose.
Freedom
Player
Democracy
Americans Love Marriage Too Much. We Rush Into Mariage With Abandon, Expecting A Micro-utopia On Earth. We Pile All Our Needs Onto It, Our Expectations, Neuroses, And Hopes. In Fact, We've Made Marriage Into The Panda Bear Of Human Social Institutions: We've Loved It To Death.
Expectations
Needs
Pandas
We Need A Kind Of Feminism That Aims Not Just To Assimilate Into The Institutions That Men Have Created Over The Centuries, But To Infiltrate And Subvert Them.
Women
Feminism
Needs
We Who Officially Value Freedom Of Speech Above Life Itself Seem To Have Nothing To Talk About But The Weather.
Freedom
Weather
Speech
What Would It Mean In Practice To Eliminate All The 'negative People' From One's Life [as Demanded By Motivational Speaker J.p. Maroney]? It Might Be A Good Idea To Separate From A Chronically Carping Spouse, But It Is Not So Easy To Abandon The Whiny Toddler, The Colicky Infant, Or The Sullen Teenager.
Teenager
Mean
Practice
The Republicans Hardly Need A Party And The Cumbersome Cadre Of Low-level Officials That Form One; They Have A Bankroll As Large As The Pentagon's Budget, Dozens Of Fatted Pacs, And The Well-advertised Support Of The Christian Deity.
Christian
Party
Support
Personally, I Can't See Why It Would Be Any Less Romantic To Find A Husband In A Nice Four-color Catalogue Than In The Average Downtown Bar At Happy Hour.
Romantic
Husband
Nice
That's The Really Neat Thing About Dan Quayle, As You Must Have Realized From The First Moment You Looked Into Those Lovely Blue Eyes: Impeachment Insurance.
Eye
Blue
Lovely
When Someone Works For Less Pay Than She Can Live On - When, For Example, She Goes Hungry So That You Can Eat More Cheaply And Conveniently - Then She Has Made A Great Sacrifice For You, She Has Made You A Gift Of Some Part Of Her Abilities, Her Health, And Her Life.
Sacrifice
Example
Pay
Our Great Common Challenge ... Is To Free People From Religion, Get It Out Of Our Laws, Our Schools, Our Health Systems, Our Government And, I Would Add, Also Our Sporting Events. I Would Really Like To See Some Separation Of Church And Stadium, If We Could Work On That.
School
Government
Law
Natural Selection, As It Has Operated In Human History, Favors Not Only The Clever But The Murderous.
Clever
Favors
Evolution
If Men Were Equally At Risk From This Condition - If They Knew Their Bellies Might Swell As If They Were Suffering From End-stage Cirrhosis, That They Would Have To Go Nearly A Year Without A Stiff Drink, A Cigarette, Or Even An Aspirin, That They Would Be Subject To Fainting Spells And Unable To Fight Their Way Onto Commuter Trains - Then I Am Sure That Pregnancy Would Be Classified As A Sexually Transmitted Disease And Abortions Would Be No More Controversial Than Emergency Appendectomies.
Pregnancy
Fighting
Men
But Our Culture Is In Truly Bad Shape If We Have Come To Define Respecting Something As The Failure To Set It On Fire.
Fire
Culture
Shapes
You Can Turn Away The Mexicans, The African-americans, The Teenagers And Other Suspect Groups, But There's No Fence High Enough To Keep Out The Repo Man.
Teenager
Men
African American
The "discovery" Of Poverty At The Beginning Of The 1960s Was Something Like The "discovery" Of America Almost Five Hundred Years Earlier. In The Case Of Each Of These Exotic Terrains, Plenty Of People Were On The Site Before The Discoverers Ever Arrived.
Discovery
Years
America
Historians Differ On When The Consumer Culture Came To Dominate American Culture. Some Say It Was In The Twenties, When Advertising Became A Major Industry And The Middle Class Bought Radios To Hear The Ads And Cars To Get To The Stores. ... But There Is No Question That The Consumer Culture Had Begun To Crowd Out All Other Cultural Possibilities By The Years Following World War Ii.
War
Years
Class
Some People Make Stuff; Other People Have To Buy It. And When We Gave Up Making Stuff, Starting In The 1980s, We Were Left With The Unique Role Of Buying... We've Shopped Till We Dropped Alright, Face Down On The Floor.
Unique
People
Roles
If You Search The Bible, You Will Find No Reference To Birth Control Or Gay Marriage, And You Will Not Find A Word, Strangely, About Stem Cell Research. I Have Searched.
Bible
Gay
Cells
By The Reagan Era, The 'culture Of Poverty' Had Become A Cornerstone Of Conservative Ideology: Poverty Was Caused Not By Low Wages Or A Lack Of Jobs But By Bad Attitudes And Faulty Lifestyles. The Poor Were Dissolute, Promiscuous, Prone To Addiction And Crime, Unable To 'defer Gratification' Or Possibly Even Set An Alarm Clock. The Last Thing They Could Be Trusted With Was Money.
Jobs
Attitude
Addiction
We [on The Left] Have To Be Used To Being A Minority -- A Small Minority -- For Some Time To Come. The Odd Thing Is That The Right, Even When It Is In Power, Likes To Think Of Itself As An Embattled Minority Against This Elite That Somehow Runs Everything. Whereas The Left, Even When It Has No Power At All, Likes To Imagine It Somehow Represents The Majority Of People. These Are Mirror-image Delusions.
Running
Thinking
Mirrors
Medical Debts Are The Number-one Cause Of Bankruptcy In America.
Numbers
America
Debt
Individually The Poor Are Not Too Tempting To Thieves, For Obvious Reasons. Mug A Banker And You Might Score A Wallet Containing A Month's Rent. Mug A Janitor And You Will Be Lucky To Get Away With Bus Fare To Flee The Crime Scene.
Bankers
Thieves
Lucky
The Obvious Liberal Rejoinders Come To Mind: What About The Child Whose Home Is Hit By A Bomb? Did She Have Some Bomb-shaped Thoughtform That Brought Ruin Down On Her Head? And Did My [fired White-collar Workers] Boot-camp Mates Cause The Layoffs That Drove Them Out Of Their Jobs By "vibrating" At A Layoff-related Frequency? It Seems Inexcusably Cruel To Tell People Who Have Reach Some Kind Of Personal Nadir That Their Probem Is Entirely Of Their Own Making.
Jobs
Children
Work
The Failure To Think Positively Can Weigh On A Cancer Patient Like A Second Disease.
Cancer
Thinking
Disease
It Used To Be Almost The First Question (just After 'can You Type?') In The Standard Female Job Interview: 'are You Now, Or Have You Ever, Contemplated Marriage, Motherhood, Or The Violent Overthrow Of The U.s. Government?
Jobs
Motherhood
Government
A Child Is Not A Salmon Mousse. A Child Is A Temporarily Disabled And Stunted Version Of A Larger Person, Whom You Will Someday Know. Your Job Is To Help Them Overcome The Disabilities Associated With Their Size And Inexperience So That They Get On With Being That Larger Person.
Jobs
Children
Inexperience
But The Economic Meltdown Should Have Undone, Once And For All, The Idea Of Poverty As A Personal Shortcoming Or Dysfunctional State Of Mind. The Lines At Unemployment Offices And Churches Offering Free Food Includes Strivers As Well As Slackers, Habitual Optimists As Well As The Chronically Depressed. When And If The Economy Recovers We Can Never Allow Ourselves To Forget How Widespread Our Vulnerability Is, How Easy It Is To Spiral Down Toward Destitution.
Offering
Should Have
Ideas
A Free-enterprise Economy Depends Only On Markets, And According To The Most Advanced Mathematical Macroeconomic Theory, Markets Depend Only On Moods: Specifically, The Mood Of The Men In The Pinstripes, Also Known As The Boys On The Street. When The Boys Are In A Good Mood, The Market Thrives; When They Get Scared Or Sullen, It Is Time For Each One Of Us To Look Into The Retail Apple Business.
Boys
Men
Apples
Whenever People Can Access Deities Directly Without The Intervention Of A Religious Hierarchy, They Don't Need To Have Hierarchy So Much.
Religious
People
Needs
To Be Homeless In America Is To Live Like A Fugitive. The Destitute Are Our Own Native-born "illegals."
America
Homeless
Born
I Complain To One Of My Fellow Servers That I Don't Understand How She Can Go So Long Without Food. "well, I Don't Understand How You Can Go So Long Without A Cigarette," She Responds In A Tone Of Reproach. Because Work Is What You Do For Others; Smoking Is What You Do For Yourself.
Long
Smoking
Complaining
No Matter That Patriotism Is Too Often The Refuge Of Scoundrels. Dissent, Rebellion, And All-around Hell-raising Remain The True Duty Of Patriots.
Peace
War
Patriotic
Even When Uttered By Democrats, "middle Class" Often Sounds Like A Mealymouthed Way Of Saying, "us, And Not Them," Where "them" Includes Poor People, Snake Handlers And Those With Pierced Tongues.
Class
Snakes
People
The Secret Of The Truly Successful, I Believe, Is That They Learned Very Early In Life How Not To Be Busy. They Saw Through That Adage, Repeated To Me So Often In Childhood, That Anything Worth Doing Is Worth Doing Well. The Truth Is, Many Things Are Worth Doing Only In The Most Slovenly, Halfhearted Fashion Possible, And Many Other Things Are Not Worth Doing At All.
Life
Success
Fashion
The Fact Is That Heterosexual Sex For Most People Is In No Way Free Of The Power Relations Between Men And Women.
Sex
Men
People
In Sci-fi Convention, Life-forms That Hadn't Developed Space Travel Were Mere Prehistory -- Horse-shoe Crabs Of The Cosmic Scene -- And Something Of The Humiliation Of Being Stuck On A Provincial Planet In A Galactic Backwater Has Stayed With Me Ever Since.
Horse
Shoes
Space
The Media Have Just Buried The Last Yuppie, A Pathetic Creature Who Had Not Heard The News That The Great Pendulum Of Public Consciousness Has Just Swung From Greed To Compassion And From Tex-mex To Meatballs
Compassion
Media
Yuppies
Once You Do Lose A Job, There Are Not A Lot Of Social Supports For You. You Lose Health Insurance Because We Have This Absurd System In America Where Health Insurance Is Usually Tied To Employment. Your Income Dips. And That's When You Get Into Selling The House.
Jobs
America
House
In A Process That Had Begun In The 1980s And Suddenly Accelerated In The Early 2000s ... [t]he Peaks Of Great Wealth Grew Higher, Rising Up Beyond The Clouds, While The Valleys Of Poverty Sank Lower Into Perpetual Shadow. The Once Broad Plateau Of The Middle Class Eroded Away Into A Narrow Ledge, With The White-knuckled Occupants Holding On For Dear Life.
Clouds
Class
White
Feminists Have Not Tried To "destroy The Family". We Just Thought The Family Was Such A Good Idea That Men Might Want To Get Involved In It Too.
Men
Ideas
Feminist
War Cannot Be Used As A Means To Prevent Or Abolish Wars. ... The Idea Of A War To Prevent War Is One Of Its Oldest, And Cruelest, Tricks.
War
Mean
Ideas
As Anyone Knows Who Has Ever Had To Set Up A Military Encampment Or Build A Village From The Ground Up, Occupations Pose Staggering Logistical Problems.
Military
Village
Occupation
The Psychological Trauma Of Losing A Job Can Be As Great As The Trauma Of A Divorce. It Creates A Lot Of Anger And Emotional Hardship. People May Become Quite Depressed.
Jobs
Divorce
Emotional
Imagine Spending Four Billion Years Stocking The Oceans With Seafood, Filling The Ground With Fossil Fuels, And Drilling The Bees In Honey Production - Only To Produce A Race Of Bed-wetters!
Business
Ocean
Race
Frankly, I Adore Your Catchy Slogan, "adoption, Not Abortion," Although No One Has Been Able To Figure Out, Even With Expert Counseling, How To Use Adoption As A Method Of Birth Control, Or At What Time Of The Month It Is Most Effective.
Adoption
Abortion
Atheism
War Has Dug Itself Into Economic Systems, Where It Offers A Livelihood To Millions ... It Has Lodged In Our Souls As A Kind Of Religion, A Quick Tonic For Political Malaise And A Bracing Antidote To The Moral Torpor Of Consumerist, Market-driven Cultures.
War
Political
Soul
From An Entertainment Point Of View, The Solar System Has Been A Bust. None Of The Planets Turns Out To Have Any Real-estate Potential, And Most Of Them Are Probably Even Useless For Filming Dune Sequels.
Real
Science
Views
Whether You Work Outside The Home Or Not, Never Tell Them [your Children] That Being A Mommy Is Your 'job.' Being A Mommy Is A Relationship, Not A Profession.
Jobs
Children
Home
Heads Of State Are Notoriously Ill Prepared For Their Mature Careers; Think Of Adolf Hitler (landscape Painter), Ho Chi Minh (seaman), And Our Own Ronald Reagan.
Pain
Thinking
Careers
The Fastest-growing Brand Of Religion Is Of The Magical 'name It And Claim It' Variety, In Which The Deity Exists Only To Meet One's Immediate, Self-identified Needs.
Self
Names
Needs
Wars Produce Warlike Societies, Which In Turn Make The World More Dangerous For Other Societies, Which Are Thus Recruited Into Being War-prone Themselves.
War
World
Produce
However And Wherever War Begins, It Persists, It Spreads, It Propagates Itself Through Time And Across Space With The Terrifying Tenacity Of A Beast Attached To The Neck Of Living Prey. This Is Not An Idly Chosen Figure Of Speech. War Spreads And Perpetuates Itself Through A Dynamic That Often Seems Independent Of Human Will. It Has, As We Like To Say Of Things We Do Not Fully Understand, 'a Life Of Its Own.
War
Independent
Space
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