Bashar al Assad

No doubt that the U.S. is a super-power capable of conquering a relatively small country, but is it able to control it?

Today, the Iraqi citizen sees that America is coming and wants to occupy his country and kill him, and he is willing to experience for himself what happened in Palestine.

Syria is geographically and politically in the middle of the Middle East.

Israeli interests are not necessarily in harmony with the American interests.

When Lebanon started its resistance it was a small and divided country.

But the issue has to do with land, which is our land.

If you go back far enough, [socialism] meant basically control of production by producers, elimination of wage labor, democratization of all spheres of life; production, commerce, education, media, workers’ control in factories, community control of communities, and so on.

One of they key problems today is that politics is such a disgrace. Good people don’t go into government.

Capital punishment is a crime. I agree with Amnesty International on that one, and indeed with most of the world. The state should have no right to take people’s lives.

The argument for liberty is…an argument…against the use of coercion to prevent others from doing better.

You can’t make decisions based on fear and the possibility of what might happen.

The Pentagon is in no sense a defense department. It has never defended the United States from anyone. It has only served to conduct aggression. And I think that the American people would be much better off without a Pentagon.

That diploma you hold in your hands today is really just your learner’s permit for the rest of the drive through life. Remember, you don’t have to be smarter than the next person, all you have to do is be willing to work harder than the next person.

[living at the White House] This isn’t about us. There’s so much history here that no one family can claim this space as their own.

I can remember from childhood, that there were neighborhoods where if you went, you’d be beaten up. You weren’t supposed to be there. The people who were doing it — kids — felt justified and righteous about it. They were defending their turf. What else do they have to defend?

The Leninist antagonism to the most essential features of socialism was evident from the very start. Lenin and Trotsky, upon assuming power, immediately devoted themselves to destroying the liberatory potential of Soviets and factory committees.

But do the governors themselves need that? Are they ready to line up under the vertikal? They are. After all, the governors are part of the country, and they also suffer from management weaknesses. Not everyone is going to like everything. You can’t please everybody, but you can find some common approaches. I was also interested in learning more about the country. I had only ever worked in St. Petersburg, apart from the time I spent abroad. . . . Of course, my seven years of experience in Peter was good experience, both administrative and managerial. But Peter isn’t the whole country. I wanted to travel and see things. So, why did you drop that interesting job and go to work as director of the FSB? Do you have some affinity for the agencies? No. I wasn’t asked whether or not I wanted to go, and they had given me no inkling that I was even being considered for such an appointment. The president simply signed a decree. . . .

It is because Russia is seen as a threat, because Russia is seen as becoming a competitor. I believe this approach is mistaken.

The devastating punch we took on September 11th still reverberates throughout American society.

Members of the U.S. House and the U.S. Senate are not there by accident. Each managed to get there for some reason. Learn what it was and you will know something important about them, about our country and about the American people.

In the midst of all the exactions of government … It is this effort, protected by law and allowed by liberty to exert itself in the manner that is most advantageous, which has maintained the progress.