The notion that you would initiate a new product without preparing the way by persuasion and advertising and salesmanship is fantastic. It's an integral part of the system.

Almost every aspect of its (Federal Reserve) history should be approached with a discriminating disregard for what is commonly taught or believed.

The man who is admired for the ingenuity of his larceny is almost always rediscovering some earlier form of fraud. The basic forms are all known, have all been practiced. The manners of capitalism improve. The morals may not.

We all agree that pessimism is a mark of superior intellect.

Inventions that are not made, like babies that are not born, are rarely missed.

Over the span of man's history, although a phenomenal amount of education, persuasion, indoctrination and incantation have been devoted to the effort, ordinary people have never been quite persuaded that toil is as agreeable as its alternatives. Thus to take increased well-being partly in the form of more goods and partly in the form of more leisure is unquestionably rational.

[Franklin Delano] Roosevelt was the central world figure in the two great disasters of this century - the Great Depression and World War II. By contrast, JFK came in relatively peaceful, agreeable times.