People From Omaha

"“I’m sure you’ll figure out how to make a system of simple laws that work.” “Yes, right after the perpetual motion machine I’m patenting,” he said cheerfully."

"Maybe you should’ve been more careful, but hindsight’s perfect and we aren’t."

"His hand contracted on the odd carven rod, a tiny thing that glittered with hints of lights and circuits and, at the same time, bone and gems, a wand constructed by an engineer, or a transmitter assembled by a shaman."

"I cannot help but think that anyone who wants power for those reasons really is not the person I want to have it."

"I will admit that I have not heard that he would directly violate his word or go back on a bargain, though he is certainly more than capable of obfuscation and creative interpretation where it suits him."

"“So,” Simon said slowly, looking around at the others, “the Leader of Humanity is going to risk herself on a ship with a sometimes devious ally, traveling to some secret destination in the Deeps of the Arena, to confront some nameless force where there won’t even be a Sky Gate to help us return if things go wrong?” He stood and lifted his glass. “Sign me up, Captain!”"

"“But there has to be an alternative.” “Why does there have to be one, Captain Austin?” Sethrik asked quietly. “Often the universe does not give us choices.”"

"“Although I cannot pretend it is merely a social visit.” “Of course—and in truth, I would be disappointed if it were! You have so much to learn, as do we, and to waste that time merely on formalities?”"

"Living creatures are essentially biological carbon-based nanotech."

"But you know there’s always that nagging set of voices out there worried that someone is doing something bad with that freedom—and of course the problem is, sometimes they’re right."

"If you’re a sensible man, you get in the habit of being very cautious of making extreme pronouncements when one’s in the sciences, especially when it’s not your core field."

"I am a scientist. I do not believe in gods or demons."

"I didn’t think I had a chance to win but I wished on a star and it came true."

"I’m doing this role because tons and tons of people are going to see me and it’s just about being the spotlight. And I’m not saying that that element is completely erased, the enjoyment, and the moment of being in front of a whole bunch of people, but not for the sake of becoming famous."

"I was obsessed with Meg Ryan, I wanted to be Meg Ryan when I grew up. And Tom Hanks was pretty well on my radar as well. So it was definitely, at that point in my life, the biggest win. I remember being at home and getting a phone call from my agent, and screaming and running around the house. And I think my mother was probably in tears."

"We had seen that the Black liberation struggle would be, as it had always been, a spark, a catalyst pushing forward the whole working-class and people’s struggle in the U.S. Far from being simply a struggle for reforms, as the revisionists claimed, it was, as Chairman Mao called it, a clarion call to all oppressed peoples throughout the world to rise up and defeat imperialism."

"Their emphasis upon strict separation of the races, their rejection of support of all whites, is in itself a capitulation to the white racist doctrine of inherent racial antagonism. Objectively, this dogma lays the basis for practical agreement with the most rabid Negrophobes, the troglodities of the fascist right, the Birchites, the American Nazi Party, the White Citizens Councils and the KKK. The racist, ultra-right has already acknowledged their unholy kinship with the Black Muslims."

"The drive of the ghetto petty-bourgeoisie for a Black controlled economy is a main dynamic of the most vocal, aggressive current within Black nationalism today - the Black Muslim movement, led by Elijah Muhammad. Profit and business, enterprise is one of the most important aspects of Muhammad's teaching."

"Behind Trotsky's revolutionary rhetoric was a simplistic social-democratic view which regarded the class struggle for socialism as solely labor against capital. This concept of class struggle did not regard the struggle of peasant against landlord, or peasant against the Czar, as a constituent part of the struggle for socialism. This was reflected as early as 1905, in Trotsky's slogan, "No Czar, but a Workers' Government," which, as Stalin had said, was "the slogan of revolution without the peasantry."9"

"Every one of these Negro workers was murdered as a direct result of the class struggle as expressed in his demand for wages or better conditions from the white landlords who exploit take Negro masses with even greater animosity than they rob of white workers."

"The "white supremacists" insist on presenting the Negro question as one of race. This makes it possible for them to "justify" the notorious color-caste system in the name of spurious race dogmas which depict the Negros servile status in American life, not as the result of man-imposed prescription, but as a condition fixed by nature. Negro inequality is supposedly due to natural inherent differences. In this credo, Negroes presumably are a lower form of organism, mentally primitive and emotionally undeveloped. "Keeping the Negro in his place" is thus allegedly prescribed by nature and fixed by Holy Writ. Color of skin is made an index to social position. Race, a strictly limited biological concept, becomes a social factor and used as an instrument for perpetuating and intensifying Negro subjugation. The Negro problem is explained in terms of natural conflict between races, the result of inborn peculiarities."

"It is clear that the Muslim leader conceives the projected Nation of Islam as a neo-colonial dependent of the dominant white power elite, and that with all their professed hatred of the white devils they are unab1e to transcend the idea of natural white overlordship."

"(In an open leter to Denver Archbishop Samuel J. Aquila) Catholic sacramental theology is based on the premise that the sacraments are the work of Christ, which is the meaning of the Church’s affirmation at Trent (DS 1608) that the sacraments act ex opere operato, or, as St. Thomas wrote in the Summa, III, 68,8: ‘The sacrament is not wrought by the righteousness of either the celebrant or the recipient, but by the power of God.’ Owing to the nature of God, Christ and his works can never be diminished by any act on our part. [...] I write as a brother bishop with the suggestion that you consider offering a public clarification of your point."

"I’m moving along on the crest of the wave that he has created. That’s to my advantage, because there is a new enthusiasm, an awareness of what it means to be church. The fact that the media has tied my wagon to his horse has been very helpful because there is a way in which the Holy Father is opening us to look at how the church can be of service to the world. That’s something I’ve always believed. People ask me whether I like what the pope is saying. I say, “Yeah, but I’ve been saying this for forty years as a priest.” The real enthusiasm that people have for the life of the church and for the moment of transition in this archdiocese is tied in many ways to what the pope is doing."

"Interviewer: That’s in fact what the pope is reported to have said in an interview published this morning in La Repubblica when asked before the elections what he thought about Donald Trump. “I do not pass judgement on persons or politicians, I just want to understand what are the sufferings that their way of proceeding causes to the poor and the excluded,” the pope is quoted as saying. Cardinal Cupich: That’s right, and I think before an election it is important that we do not single people out and speak about them in a personal way. That has never been our our way of acting, and it is disturbing that some have deviated from that tradition and practice. We need to return to speaking about these issues without speaking directly about individuals and criticizing them personally."

"The person of faith, (Henri Nouwen) says, is able to see in that moment the faithful presence of God, the one who has never left us, who keeps his word. He comes and picks up those bricks from the crumbling wall and begins to fashion something new, not a wall but a concave space, where we are invited to a deeper intimacy with the ones we love and with God. It is in that greater sharing, that greater intimacy that we begin to realize that the real stability in life is not the wall of our accomplishments but the faithfulness of the ones we love and the faithfulness of God, because both reveal how rich life is in keeping a promise, in keeping one's word. There is nothing to compare with having someone keep their word to us."

"(About the Catholic Church sexual abuse cases). [Prelates] have to be very clear about an accountability procedure for accusations about bishops. Bishops have to, as a group, say, 'We cede our rights as bishops to have somebody else come in and investigate us,'. Every bishop has to be willing to say, 'I will allow myself to be investigated by an independent group if there is an accusation against me.'"

"Receiving the Eucharist is not a private action but rather a communal one, as the very word "communion" implies. [...] or that reason, the norm established by the Holy See for the universal church and approved by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops is for the faithful to process together as an expression of their coming forward as the Body of Christ and to receive Holy Communion standing."

"These stories offer us a model of how real refreshment of body and spirit is achieved. Three things are worth noting. First, rest comes as an invitation from Jesus. Recently, Pope Francis recommended to a group of priests that they should be open to the rest that comes from Jesus, rather than relying on other ways to relax, some of which can be very unhealthy, if not destructive. We can use entertainment, mind altering substances and other means that only serve as a temporary release of tension and fatigue. Superficial at best, these efforts end up provoking more restlessness and lethargy, especially if they bring upon guilt and depression. It is known, for instance, that alcohol can be a depressant and impact our overall mood. Jesus offers us the gift of rest, and so the first step is to surrender to the kind of rest he offers, and accept his invitation, rather than taking on this burden ourselves. Second, his invitation is to go to an “out of the way” place, a deserted place. This is not an invitation to take a vacation to an exotic location, but rather a summons to enter into those places in our lives that we ignore, yet which have an impact on us."

"There's room for saying things in bright shiny colours."

"I’m dead serious about being nonsensical."

"I am not a big fan of meaning. Logic is also another nebulous thought. I attempt to bring threads of subjects, however shaggy, to my work and inject little suggesters to the picture itself, and this often puts a smile on my face."

"Most artists are doing basically the same thing — staying off the streets."

"I have always believed that people have misjudged the accuracy of economic forecasting... During the 1980s and 1990s, I researched and applied methods of high frequency economic forecasting, to be used by themselves, and for objective establishment of initial conditions for longer range forecasts from structural dynamic models that carry forward the pioneering contributions of Jan Tinbergen."

"The basic point is that economies are very complex — there are millions of actors — and to understand how they will respond to some change is extremely challenging,” says n. “His contribution, building in part on the work of others, was developing a manageable way of representing economies and how they would change with different kinds of policy changes.”"

"Although I was not aware of it at the time, the experience of growing up during the Great Depression was to have a profound impact on my intellectual and professional career."

"The centrally planned economies, dissatisfied with the outcome of their own efforts to achieve good economic growth performance, have changed strategy and decided to import high technology from the West. as well as necessary grains to supplement their domestic agicultural supplies. This new approach has opened their economies to Western inflation because imports have been reflecting rising world price. Gold and oil sales at correspondingly rising prices have been used by the Soviet Union to finance part of their import needs. but they are fully enmeshed in world inflation accounting in balancing rising export prices."

"At Chicago, I was in the midst of a veritable galaxy of stars: Trygve Haavelmo, Tjalling Koopmans, Theodore Anderson, Leonid Hurwicz, Herman Rubin, Kenneth Arrow, , , and Herbert Simon, among others. I completed my first of a series of macroeconometric models, solidified my understanding of econometrics, learned (through endless discussion) about the functioning of the economy, and got started on several theoretical paths such as aggregation, demand systems, and prediction."

"I think the Kennedy-Johnson tax cut was a marvelous success in 1964. It was too bad it was not implemented a little sooner, and Kennedy died, of course. After that, Johnson dallied for a while about raising taxes to pay for the war in Vietnam. The stimulus did not get reversed until the tax increase and expenditure cap of 1969, and that had a quick effect once it was enacted. As you know, we had a recession in 1969–1970."

"Balancing fiscal and monetary policies is a problem. If you do just one thing, it is not necessarily enough—neither monetary policy alone nor fiscal policy alone, and neither tax cuts nor expenditure increases alone. You need to mix policy. By having the right balance, you can get high employment and stable prices."

"From Keynes' point of view the economic system, before the war failed in its solution of the unemployment problem"

"In the past few years there has grown up a large group of young economists who have accepted the theoretical doctrines of the Keynesian Revolution and who have come into national prominence through their support of an economic policy of full employment."

"People say monetary policy is easy and quick to implement. It can even be done overnight on the telephone, they say fiscal policy drags out in political and congressional debate in our country. It might take months to implement. But the point is that once fiscal policy is implemented, it might go to work much faster than monetary policy."

"There are many reasons there was higher inflation in the 1970s. But that is a complicated story that deals with much more than tax policies."

"I believe that monetary policy has a chronic defect. It is asymmetric—it works better in restraining an economy than in stimulating an economy."

"You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make him drink. Or monetary policy is pulling on a string when the economy is strong. That works. But when the economy is weak and you are cutting interest rates, it can be like pushing on a string. It does not work as well."

"At the beginning of a decade it is tempting to look ahead for the next ten years."

"It is my firm belief that the only satisfactory test of economics is the ability to predict, and in crucial predictive situations such as reconversion after World War II, the settlement of the Korean War, the settlement of the Vietnam War, the abrupt economic policy switch of the Nixon Administration in August 1972, the oil shock of 1973 (forecast of a world-wide succession by LINK), the recession of 1990. In these crucial periods, econometric models outperformed other approaches, yet there is considerable room for improvement, and that is precisely what is being examined in development of high-frequency models that aim to forecast the economy, every week, every fortnight, or every month, depending on the degree of fineness of the information flow."

"The centrally planned economics used to consider themselves well insulated against the economic ills of the rest of the world. This is no longer the case."

"The 37-year-old was remarkable not just for Wadewitz’ Wikipedia contributions, but for her focus on chronicling the overwhelmingly under-researched roles played by women in history and present-day life."