In the Soviet Union it was illegal to take a photograph of a train station. Look what happened to them. They tried to classify everything.

The control of information is something the elite always does, particularly in a despotic form of government. Information, knowledge, is power. If you can control information, you can control people.

The point of life was to press on, to do the best you can, to make the world a better place.

Civilians listened to officers, which said a lot about the intelligence of civilians.

The general difference between conservatives and liberals is that liberals like pretty pictures and conservatives like to build bridges that people can drive across.

Jack looked out the window as they passed the Mormon temple, just outside the beltway near Connecticut Avenue. A decidedly odd-looking building, it had grandeur with its marble columns and gilt spires. The beliefs represented by that impressive structure seemed curious to Ryan, a lifelong Catholic, but the people who held them were honest and hardworking, and fiercely loyal to their country, because they believed in what America stood for.

Being a victim is more palatable than having to recognize the intrinsic contradictions of one's own governing philosophy.