Sublime
An inspiration engine for ideas
It was all part of a way of doing things in the United States that, as I would gradually realize, forced you to be constantly on guard, constantly worried that whatever amount of money you had or earned would never be enough,
Anu Partanen • The Nordic Theory of Everything: In Search of a Better Life
The noble has gone down on the social ladder, and the roturier has gone up; the one descends as the other rises. Every half century brings them nearer to each other, and they will very shortly meet.
Alexis de Tocqueville • Democracy in America, Volume I and II (Optimized for Kindle)
La Virginie a joué un rôle de premier plan dans la révolution américaine. C’est là que se trouvent 40 % des esclaves du pays, mais c’est de là aussi que viennent la majeure partie des acteurs de la révolte qui a éclaté au nom de la liberté.
Bernard Chamayou • Contre-histoire du libéralisme (POCHES ESSAIS t. 416) (French Edition)
Florida drew the transient and rootless on the eternal promise of a second chance, with more than its share of scammers and con men. So who was to say the guy living next door wasn’t one of them? A subdivision like Carriage Pointe was Jane Jacobs’s vision of hell.
George Packer • The Unwinding
Determined to unshackle market forces from the heavy hand of the state and the millstone of “tax and spend,” the classes that led this bloc aimed to liberalize and globalize the capitalist economy. What that meant, in reality, was financialization: dismantling barriers to, and protections from, the free movement of capital; deregulating banking and
... See moreNancy Fraser • The Old is Dying and the New Cannot Be Born: From Progressive Neoliberalism to Trump and Beyond
omnipresent heretical conspiracy to overthrow all property relations
Marvin Harris • Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches: The Riddles of Culture
He had to save the nation from its own moral failings because other men were unable to contain their sexual passions.
Elaine Tyler May • Homeward Bound: American Families in the Cold War Era
The luxuriously rich are not simply kept comfortably warm, but unnaturally hot; as I implied before, they are cooked, of course à la mode.
Henry David Thoreau • Walden (AmazonClassics Edition)
Equal and independent people will satisfy their own desires with no obligation to others outside their narrow circle. The chance to be anything or anyone gives them the idea that they don’t owe anything to anyone. They grow indifferent to the common good and withdraw from others into the pursuit of personal happiness, especially wealth. Tocqueville
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