Recent

Thomas Jefferson, third president of the US, was a severe critic of what he called "the selfish spirit of commerce [that] knows no country, and feels no passion or principle but that of gain.” In the early years of the 19th century, as banks and corporations began to flex their political muscles, he announced that: “I hope we shall crush . . . in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." Physically unable to accept an invitation to speak in Washington on the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson instead sent remarks to be read, including the following: “The general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth, that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God.” — John Nichols

On a 2011 trip up Alaska’s “inland passage,” I picked up one of those free, ad-filled tour guides for the region. There were brief profiles of several towns in that coastal region formally known as the Alexander Archipeligo. For the town of Sitka, the book noted the remnants of Russian influence, including Orthodox churches. The book summarizes the town's history as "a unique blend of Tlingit (a native Alaskan nation) culture, Russian imperialism and, ultimately, American expansionism." It's those dirty Ruskies who want empire. Us? We just expand. — Ken Sehested

In San Francisco, a billboard for an e-trading firm proclaimed, “Make love not war,” and then—down at the bottom—“Screw it, just make money." — Barbara Ehrenreich

On Aug. 28, 1963, Rabbi Joachin Prinz came to the microphone to address the March on Washington crowd just before Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech. “Bigotry and hatred are not the most urgent problem,” Prinz said. “The most urgent, the most disgraceful, the most shameful and the most tragic problem is silence.” — David Wilkinson

Psychologist and social scientist Dacher Keltner says the rich really are different, and not in a good way: Their life experience makes them less empathetic, less altruistic, and generally more selfish. “We have now done 12 separate studies measuring empathy in every way imaginable, social behavior in every way, and some work on compassion and it’s the same story,” he said. “Lower class people just show more empathy, more prosocial behavior, more compassion, no matter how you look at it.” Last year, research at Duke and Harvard universities showed that regardless of political affiliation or income, Americans tended to think wealth distribution ought to be more equal. The problem? Rich people wrongly believed it already was. — Brian Alexander

Money is the liquor of politics. Our politicians are drunk from it. Without the shock of an intervention, you can’t expect them to recover. What form that intervention takes, I can’t predict. . . Maybe we’ll find out. Meanwhile, don’t give your heart to any candidate who won’t swear off the booze. — Bill Moyers

How dull it is to pause, to make an end, To rust unburnished, not to shine in use! As though to breathe were life. — Lord Alfred Tennyson

When heroes die, it is human nature to wrap their lives in metal, marble and granite. We do this that we might remember them, but there is in the remembering also a kind of reduction. The rough and jagged lines of a life lived at the forefront, lived in controversy, conflict and trial, become something smooth and safe enough for children. . . . His life has become a bedtime story. In our day, poor people find themselves denigrated and demeaned in ways that shock conscience. Former South Carolina Lt. Governor Andre Bauer once likened them to stray animals one feeds at the back door. Fox News pundit John Stossel sees them as the enemy in a battle between “the makers and the takers.” Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning compares them to scavenging "raccoons." Ann Coulter says welfare creates ‘irresponsible animals." — Leonard Pitts

A number of analysts have observed that although bin Laden was finally killed, he won some major successes in his war against the U.S. "He repeatedly asserted that the only way to drive the U.S. from the Muslim world and defeat its satraps was by drawing Americans into a series of small but expensive wars that would ultimately bankrupt them. 'Bleeding the U.S.,' in his words." — Eric Margolis

To the chagrin of many friends, Will [Campbell] insisted that since “we’re all bastards but God loves us anyway,” there was grace even for racists. It is grace found, not in “acquittal by law” but “acquittal by resurrection,” that “takes us into a freedom where it would never occur to us to kill somebody.” — Bill Leonard