02 July 2009

Photo of the Week #26

I hope everyone has a great 4th of July holiday weekend. And remember, it's men and women, like those flying the jets below, as well as diligent citizens, that allow all of us in the US to continue to enjoy the freedoms with which we are blessed.

A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor and bread it has earned -- this is the sum of good government. -- Thomas Jefferson
Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it. -- Thomas Paine



1 Comment:

Stephanie said...

Here's a quote from Einstein that seems to tie in with your Jefferson quote:

"I am convinced that demonstrative reference to armaments are but a weapon in the hands of the factors interested in their production or in the maintenance and development of a military system for financial or political--egotistic--reasons.

I am firmly of the opinion that the educational effect of a first and genuine achievement in the realm of the first and genuine achievement in the realm of disarmament would prove highly efficacious, because the succeeding second and third steps would then be immeasurably simpler than the initial one; this for the obvious reason that the first results of an understanding would considerable weaken the familiar argument for national security with which parliamentarians of all countries now permit themselves to be intimidated.

Armaments can never be viewed as an economic asset to a state. They must ever remain the unproductive exploitation of men and material and an encroachment on the economic reserves of a state through the temporary conscription of men in the active periods of their lives--not to mention the moral impairment resulting from a preoccupation with the profession of war and the moral processes of preparing a nation for it."

Best,
Stephanie