Quotes About Demagogues

The owners of factories are more concerned than other classes and interests in the intelligence of their laborers. When the latter are well-educated and the former are disposed to deal justly, controversies and strikes can never occur, nor can the minds of the masses be prejudiced by demagogues and controlled by temporary and factious considerations.

Jacqueline Jones argues, "Race signifies neither a biological fact, nor a primal prejudice, and it lacks the coherence of a robust political ideology; rather, it is a collection of fluid, contingent mythologies borne of (among other imperatives) fighting a war, assembling a labor force, advancing the designs of demagogues, organizing a labor union, and preserving voting and public schooling as privileges reserved for some, rather than as rights shared by all.

When demagogues and dictators ban art, this is the reason: art is the great solvent of obedient fundamentalism.

What was said of Romania's institutions of higher education between the two World Wars—that they were numerically swollen, academically rather lax, and politically overheated, as well as veritable incubators of surplus bureaucrats, politicians, and demagogues56—could be said of such institutions in other nations in Eastern and Southeastern Europe during that era and in various nations of Asia, Africa, and Latin America in later times.

Demagogues and agitators are very unpleasant, but they are incidents to a free and constitutional country, and you must put up with these inconveniences or do without many important advantages.

In every age the vilest specimens of human nature are to be found among demagogues.

Are there any monuments built to demagogues? I just don't think so.

Public crises, particularly those concerning life and death, offer demagogues ample opportunity to amass more power.

the Union's democratic deficit could easily turn from unconcern into hostility, into a sense that decisions were being taken 'there' with unfavourable consequences for us 'here' and over which 'we' had no say: a prejudice fuelled by irresponsible mainstream politicians but fanned by nationalist demagogues.

Seeing disagreement as disloyalty is another hallmark of demagogues, dictators, and strong-arm leaders.

Because of demagogues, rhetoric has a tainted reputation in our time. However, rhetoric is central to democratic governance. It can fuse passion and persuasion, moving free people to freely choose what is noble.

Freedom of press and freedom of speech: What a blessing for a country while in the hands of honest, patriotic men; what a curse if in the hands of designing demagogues.

On its own, being a decent person is no guarantee that you will act well, which brings us back to the one protection we have against demagogues, tricksters, and the madness of crowds, and our surest guide through the uncertain shoals of life: clear and reasoned thinking. Logic will never fail you, unless you're unaware of—or deliberately ignore—the consequences of your deeds.

Although he trusted the good sense of the people in the long run, he believed that they could easily be misled by demagogues. He was a realist who had no illusions about human nature. "The motives which predominate most human affairs," he said, "are self-love and self-interest." The common people, like the common soldiers in his army, could not be expected to be "influenced by any other principles than those of interest.

As the Framers knew, democracy can fall to charismatic demagogues, would-be monarchs, self-interested kleptocrats, sophisticated criminals, and high-functioning morons.

Before we begin on that story, let me make clear that I strongly approve of studying racist, right-wing demagogues and figuring out what can be done to defeat them. I have spent my adult life engaged in exactly this project. Calling such figures "populists," however, is a mistake if defeating them is really our purpose. Opponents of the Right should be claiming the high ground of populism, not ceding it to guys like Donald Trump.

And when voters lose control of these important decisions, they risk the hijacking of their democracy by ignorant demagogues, or the more quiet and gradual decay of their democratic institutions into authoritarian technocracy. Experts, too, have an important responsibility in a democracy, and it is one they've shirked in recent decades.

The American President] has to take all sorts of abuse from liars and demagogues.… The people can never understand why the President does not use his supposedly great power to make 'em behave. Well, all the President is, is a glorified public relations man who spends his time flattering, kissing and kicking people to get them to do what they are supposed to do anyway.

Aristotle warned that inequality brought instability, while Plato believed that demagogues exploited free speech to install themselves as tyrants. In founding a democratic republic upon law and establishing a system of checks and balances, the Founding Fathers sought to avoid the evil that they, like the ancient philosophers, called tyranny.

As they knew, Aristotle warned that inequality brought instability, while Plato believed that demagogues exploited free speech to install themselves as tyrants.

Aristotle warned that inequality brought instability, while Plato believed that demagogues exploited free speech to install themselves as tyrants.

Paralysis in decision-making breeds frustration and contempt from the electorate, and provides the perfect seedbed for demagogues who fill the vacuum with populist simplicities, hatred of opposition and lies.

He has used this undeserved respect, in conjunction with other black demagogues, to transform a civil rights movement that once stood for race-neutrality in the law, into a vigilante posse seeking one law for "people of color" and another for the rest of America.

for no greatness is so great that it can rise above the laws of human affection, or live beyond the jurisdiction of pain, as certain demagogues would have the people believe