Better the occasional faults of a government that lives in a spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a government frozen in the ice of its own indifference.
Interpretation
It's better to have a government that makes mistakes while showing compassion than one that is indifferent and does nothing.
This quote by Franklin D. Roosevelt emphasizes the importance of a government that displays empathy and takes action, even if that action may sometimes lead to errors. It critiques a stagnation marked by indifference, suggesting that the spirit of charity and willingness to engage in governance, despite its imperfections, is far more desirable than a cold, detached approach that fails to address the needs of the people.
In practice
This quote could be used in a speech advocating for social welfare programs.
There has been one persistent theme through all Axis propaganda. This theme has been that Americans are admittedly rich, that Americans have considerable industrial power - but that Americans are soft and decadent, that they cannot and will not unite and work and fight. ... Let them tell that to the Marines!
The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today.
A war of ideas can no more be won without books than a naval war can be won without ships. Books, like ships, have the toughest armor, the longest cruising range, and mount the most powerful guns.
Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds.
A world turned into a stereotype, a society converted into a regiment, a life translated into a routine, make it difficult for either art or artists to survive. Crush individuality in society and you crush art as well. Nourish the conditions of a free life and you nourish the arts, too.
We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics. Out of the collapse of a prosperity whose builders boasted their practicality has come the conviction that in the long run economic morality pays.
Powerful government tends to draw into it people with bloated egos, people who think they know more than everyone else and have little hesitance in coercing their fellow man. Or as Nobel Laureate Friedrich Hayek said, "in government, the scum rises to the top".
Elections belong to the people. It's their decision. If they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their behinds, then they will just have to sit on their blisters.
As long as in this territory west of the Jordan river there is only one political entity called Israel, it is going to be either non-Jewish or non-democratic. If this bloc of millions of Palestinians cannot vote, that will be an apartheid state.
It's time for me to give out an award to newly elected Majority Leader John Boehner. Mr. Boehner was elected just a few days ago to reform House Republicans, who are feeling the heat from lobbyist scandals. Well, CNN found out that he rents his two-bedroom apartment from a lobbyist who had clients who had interests in legislation that Boehner sponsored. And for that, Mr. Boehner, you've just won a pair of Stephen Colbert's big brass balls.
It is one of history's ironies that Communism, advertised as a classless society, tended to breed a privileged class of feudal proportions.
You do not examine legislation in the light of the benefits it will convey if properly administered, but in the light of the wrongs it would do and the harms it would cause if improperly administered.
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