You will never understand bureaucracies until you understand that for bureaucrats procedure is everything and outcomes are nothing.

Some people say that taxes are the price we pay for civilization. But the runaway taxes of our time are the price we pay for being gullible.

There is no talent so ardently supported, nor generously rewarded, as the ability to convince parasites they are victims.

If you have ever seen a four-year-old trying to lord it over a two-year-old, then you know what the basic problem of human nature is - and why government keeps growing larger and ever more intrusive.

It is precisely those members of Congress who have had the most to do with creating the risks that led to the current economic crisis who are making the most noise against others, and summoning people before their committee to be browbeaten and humiliated on nationwide television.

Egalitarians create the most dangerous inequality of all - inequality of power. Allowing politicians to determine what all other human beings will be allowed to earn is one of the most reckless gambles imaginable. Like the income tax, it may start off being applied only to the rich but it will inevitably reach us all.

A friend from India told me that a countryman of his said: "I want to go to America. I want to see a country where poor people are fat."