"...extremism in defense of liberty is no vice...moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue." 
- Barry Goldwater 1964 Republican National Convention

"One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors."
- Plato

"Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it."
-President Ronald Reagan

"Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys." -P.J. O'Rourke

"The strongest reason for people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government."
- Thomas Jefferson

"One thing is certain: those who worked and voted for less government, the very foot soldiers in the conservative revolution, have been deceived. Today, the ideal of limited government has been abandoned by the GOP, and real conservatives find their views no longer matter."
- Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas), The Federalist, 7/16/03

"People now have had a chance to digest what happened on 9/11 and the government response to it, and more and more people are realizing that the government is using the fear of terrorism as a rationale to take away our privacy and our civil liberties," 
-Former Republican U.S. Congressman Robert L. "Bob" Barr Jr. of Georgia (native Iowan)

"I don’t believe in a government that protects us from ourselves."
- Ronald Reagan, "Inside Ronald Reagan," Reason magazine, July 1975

“I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachment of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations."
- Founding Father James Madison

"I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents...."
-James Madison

"If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free."
-P.J. O'Rourke

"A lot of so-called conservatives today don't know what the word means. They think I've turned liberal because I believe a woman has a right to an abortion. That's a decision that's up to the pregnant woman, not up to the pope or some do-gooders or the religious right. It's not a conservative issue at all."
- Barry Goldwater, 1994 Los Angeles Times interview.

"A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul."
- George Bernard Shaw

"It is a popular delusion that the government wastes vast amounts of money through inefficiency and sloth. Enormous effort and elaborate planning are required to waste this much money."
- P. J. O'Rourke

"Thank God we don't get all the government we pay for."
-- Milton Friedman (or John Dooley)

"That government is best which governs least."
- Thomas Paine

"Be thankful we're not getting all the government we're paying for."
-- Will Rogers

"What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants."
- Thomas Jefferson, The "Tree of Liberty" letter to William Smith, November 13, 1787

"I have little interest in streamlining government or in making it more efficient, for I mean to reduce its size. I do not undertake to promote welfare, for I propose to extend freedom. My aim is not to pass laws, but to repeal them. It is not to inaugurate new programs, but to cancel old ones that do violence to the Constitution, or that have failed in their purpose, or that impose on the people an unwarranted financial burden. I will not attempt to discover whether legislation is 'needed' before I have first determined whether it is constitutionally permissible. And if I should later be attacked for neglecting my constituents' interests, I shall reply that I was informed their main interest is liberty and that in that cause I am doing the very best I can." 
-- Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-Ariz.), "The Conscience of a Conservative"

"The American Republic will endure, until politicians realize they can bribe the people with their own money." 
-- Alexis de Tocqueville --

"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves money from the public treasure. From that moment on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most money from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world's great civilizations has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through the following sequence:
from bondage to spiritual faith,
from spiritual faith to great courage,
from courage to liberty,
from liberty to abundance,
from abundance to selfishness,
from selfishness to complacency,
from complacency to apathy,
from apathy to dependency,
from dependency back to bondage."
-- Alexander Tyler

"I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism. The basis of conservatism is a desire for less government interference or less centralized authority or more individual freedom and this is a pretty general description also of what libertarianism is." 
- Ronald Reagan, "Inside Ronald Reagan," Reason magazine, July 1975

"Our Constitution was not written in the sands to be washed away by each wave of new judges blown in by each successive political wind."
-Hugo L. Black

"Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor, or caprice?"
- George Washington, Farewell Address 1796

"Yes, the president should resign. He has lied to the American people time and time again, and betrayed their trust. He is no longer an effective leader. Since he has admitted guilt, there is no reason to put the American people through an impeachment. He will serve absolutely no purpose in finishing out his term; the only possible solution is for the president to save some dignity and resign."
- William Jefferson Clinton, 1974 (During Watergate)

"Our government has kept us in a perpetual state of fear - kept us in a continuous stampede of patriotic fervor - with the cry of grave national emergency. Always there has been some terrible evil at home or some monstrous foreign power that was going to gobble us up if we did not blindly rally behind it."
- Gen. Douglas MacArthur