Nothing in these abstract economic models actually works in the real w — Understanding Power

"See, the "science" [of political economy] happens to be a very flexible one: you can change it to do whatever you feel like, its that kind of "science."

"The real lesson of Nixons fall is that the President shouldnt call Thomas Watson and McGeorge Bundy bad names—that means the Republics collapsing. And the press prides itself on having exposed this fact. On the other hand, if you want to send the FBI to organize the assassination of a Black Panther leader, thats fine by us; its fine by the Washington Post too."

"In a traditional society like the feudal system, people had a certain place, and they had certain rights—in fact, they had what was called at the time a "right to live." I mean, under feudalism it may have been a lousy right, but nevertheless people were assumed to have some natural entitlement for survival. But with the rise of what we call capitalism, that right had to be destroyed: people had to have it knocked out of their heads that they had any automatic "right to live" beyond what they could win for themselves on the labor market. And that was the main point of classical economics."

"… there are no two points of view more antithetical than classical liberalism and capitalism—and thats why when the University of Chicago publishes a bicentennial edition of Smith, they have to distort the text (which they did): because as a true classical liberal, Smith was strongly opposed to all of the idiocy they now sprout in his name."

"You cant just come before the electorate and say, "Vote for me, Im trying to screw you." So what theyve had to do is appeal to the population on some other grounds. Well, there arent a lot of other grounds, and everybody always picks the same ones, whether his name is Hitler or anything else—jingoism, racism, fear, religious fundamentalism: these are the ways of appealing to people if you’re trying to organize a mass base of support for policies that are really intended to crush them."

"See, people with power understand exactly one thing: violence."