Benjamin Britton > Recent Status Updates

"We did everything within the state of Vermont, everything 'in-house,' usually my house. You should have seen how we wrote the radio ads- around my kitchen table."

"We did everything within the state of Vermont, everything 'in-house,' usually my house. You should have seen how we wrote the radio ads- around my kitchen table."

"we looked into the future with impatient joy… Faraway countries, heroic deeds, beautiful women whirled round and round in our turbulent imaginations."

"I now know by an unbelievable coincidence of fate that I am destined to travel."

"Most of all, this book is about the struggle to maintain a vision of economic and social justice, and the optimism necessary to keep that vision alive."

"This exceptional man knew how to use his intelligence and judgement in all the circumstances he encountered, taking advantage of each moment as if it were the last sip of the mate infusion he was devoted to." Hilda Barrio

"And the other whom they seek to destroy, contrary to what they try to argue, is not Bin Laden and terrorism, but the multitude. This passage is absolutely fundamental. The capitalist attempt to present this war as total destruction of the other is a big hoax… for them, most of all." Toni Negri

"Enable every women who can work to take her place on the labour front, under the principle of equal pay for equal work. This should be done as quickly as possible." Mao

"In order to build a great socialist society, it is of the utmost importance to arouse the broad masses of women to join in productive activity." Mao

"Dig a sufficient number of trenches, store sufficient grain. And do not strive for world domination." Mao Zedong

"People of the world, be courageous, and dare to fight, defy difficulties and advance wave upon wave. Then the whole world will belong to the people. Monsters of all kind shall be destroyed." Mao

"Eradicate the four pests (mosquitos, flies, rats and bedbugs) and pay attention to hygiene."

"Our educational policy must enable everyone who receives an education to develop morally, intellectually, and physically and become a worker with both socialist consciousness and culture."

"The army must become one with the people so that they see it as their own army." Mao

"It can therefore be said that politics is war without bloodshed while war is politics with bloodshed." Mao

"Who are our enemies? Who are our friends? There is a question of the first importance for the revolution." Mao

"Political power brings with it risks that no anti-capitalist movement can dare to ignore. But it is also the only power with which capitalism can be opposed and a new society can be built." J.C. Myers

"Not much is left, in short, of pictorial genre that once was aimed to inspire the Chinese people, to mobilize them and point them the way to the future Communist utopia. Politics is dead, and consumerism very much alive." Stefan Landsberger

"The Cultural Revolution, finally, which the authors rightly call 'the great purge', had nothing to do with renewing an ossified party and everything to do with simple revenge." Arthur Waldron

"The points made in this section are sufficient to refute Jung Chang's likening of Mao to Hitler. In fact, it is easy to find counter-arguments to most, if not all, of Jung Chang's claims throughout the best ok. It simply requires a careful reading and the application of reason." Jin Xiaoding

"Since Mao foresaw the arrival of capitalism, and even anticipated its top campaigner, it seems logical that he would have launched the Cultural Revolution to prevent that happening."

"In fact, this figure is inflated from an initial 0.7 million by Jung Chang's arbitrary multiplication. These 0.7 million deaths, although a big loss of human life, resulted from the final stage of the civil war and the Korean War."."

"Chan, in his coup d'oeil review (in this volume), shows unequivocally that Chang and Halliday's '[n]ew information is manufactured out of a manipulation of facts to such extreme that they can no longer be sustained by empirical evidence', that the co-authors 'prioritize entertainment, sensationalism and titillation over historical accuracy.'" Mobo Gao

"If see Man only as a manipulator, we will not only fail to understand how he conquered a generation of intellectuals; we will also underestimate his talent in making himself the representative of ideology and nationalism."

"A subject as complex as Mao's life and times cannot be treated in stark black and white terms…As for Chang and Halliday, they have created more myths than they debunked."

"It is small comfort that the 'facts ' in the Da Vinci Code are about reliable as those to be found in Mao: The Unknown Story." David S.G. Goodman

"I admit that idea, that divine Providence has created two men exactly alike, and that a benevolent government, seeing the hand of Providence, provided a berth for two twins."

"Everyone has his fixed position, and if this is a joke it is a joke in very bad taste. I will say more: it is utterly immoral, for, I make bold to assure you, sir, my own views which I have expounded above, in regard to keeping one's own place, are purely moral."

"Sleep descended upon his devoted head, and he slept as people generally do sleep who are not used to drinking and have consumed five glasses of punch at some festive gathering."