yazadjal.com

The Politician’s corpse was laid away.
While all of his acquaintance sneered and slanged,
I wept: for I had longed to see him hanged.
“Epitaph on the Politician” by Hilaire Belloc (1870 - 1953).
I know it’s a few days late, but that’s what I felt when Arafat died. However I only saw the quote today on Survival Arts.

The supreme irony of life is that no one gets out of it alive.
~ Robert Heinlein

Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end.
~ Lord Acton
If the name sounds familiar, it’s because of he’s the same man who said “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
Here’s a brief bio.

The more corrupt the State the more numerous the laws.
~ Cornelius Tacitus (AD 55?-117?)
Quote source: Freedom’s Nest. Biographical info on Cornelius Tacitus
in Wikipedia.
Doesn’t look like this has been heeded in India. Bibek Debroy has done a lot of work in this area, estimating that there are 35,000+ laws in India (the exact number, […]

Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated, but those who torment us for our own […]