Sunday, August 14, 2016

On Fear, III

"This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance."

-Franklin Delano Roosevelt, First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1933.
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5057/

"...at no previous time has American security been as seriously threatened from without as it is today.
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"in no case had a serious threat been raised against our national safety or our continued independence.
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"the United States as a nation has at all times maintained clear, definite opposition, to any attempt to lock us in behind an ancient Chinese wall 
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"No realistic American can expect from a dictator's peace international generosity, or return of true independence
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"Those, who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety."
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"We must especially beware of that small group of selfish men who would clip the wings of the American eagle in order to feather their own nests.
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"The first phase of the invasion of this Hemisphere would not be the landing of regular troops. The necessary strategic points would be occupied by secret agents and their dupes—and great numbers of them are already here...
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"That is why the future of all the American republics is today in serious danger.
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"The best way of dealing with the few slackers or trouble makers in our midst is, first, to shame them by patriotic example, and, if that fails, to use the sovereignty of government to save government.
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"...four essential human freedoms.

"The first is freedom of speech and expression—everywhere in the world.

"The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way—everywhere in the world.

"The third is freedom from want—which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants—everywhere in the world.

"The fourth is freedom from fear—which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor—anywhere in the world.
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"...the moral order. A good society is able to face schemes of world domination and foreign revolutions alike without fear."

-FDR, State of the Union, January 6, 1941.


Preamble

"Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,

Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people..."

-Universal Declaration of Human Rights, United Nations General Assembly, December 10, 1948.

http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/index.html