Aphorisms that seem to fit our global situation

“If it sounds to good to be true, it probably is”, unknown

“The short memories of American voters is what keeps our politicians in office”, Will Rogers

“The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground”, Thomas Jefferson

"If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there'd be a shortage of sand", Milton Friedman

"No one can earn a million dollars honestly", William Jennings Bryan

"An economic forecaster is like a cross-eyed javelin thrower: they don't win many accuracy contests, but they keep the crowd's attention", unknown

“The point to remember is that what the Government gives it must first take away” John Caldwell

"If all economists were laid end to end, they would not reach a conclusion", George Bernard Shaw.

“A good scare is worth more to a man than good advice”, Edgar Howe

“Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build a bridge even where there is no river”, Nikita Krushchev.

“Financial sense is knowing that certain men will promise to do certain things, and fail”, Ed Howe.

"Christmas is a time when kids tell Santa what they want and adults pay for it. Deficits are when adults tell the government what they want and their kids pay for it", Richard Lamm

“A politician thinks of the next election; a statesman, of the next generation”, J.F. Clarke

“We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we now know that it is bad economics”, Franklin Roosevelt

"Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve", George Bernard Shaw

"The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent vice of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries", Winston Churchill

"A government with the policy to rob Peter to pay Paul can be assured of the support of Paul", George Bernard Shaw

“Everything is changing. People are taking their comedians seriously and the politicians as a joke”, Will Rogers

"A democracy ... can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largess of the public treasury. From that time on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the results that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship", Sir Alex Fraser Tytler

"A banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining and wants it back the minute it begins to rain", Mark Twain

“There's a sucker born every minute”, David Hannum

“A politician needs the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn't happen”, Winston Churchill

"As people do better, they start voting like Republicans - unless they have too much education and vote Democratic, which proves there can be too much of a good thing", Karl Rove

"An economist is an expert who will know tomorrow why the things he predicted yesterday didn't happen today", Lawrance Peter

“Be thankful we're not getting all the government we're paying for”, Will Rogers

"When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the first things to be bought and sold are legislators", P. J. O'Rourke

“When a lot of remedies are suggested for a disease, that means it cannot be cured”, Anton Chekhov

"Lift the curtain and 'the State' reveals itself as a little group of fallible men in Whitehall, making guesses about the future, influenced by political prejudices and partisan prejudices, and working on projections drawn from the past by a staff of economists", Enoch Powell

“What this country needs are more unemployed politicians”, Edward Langley

“The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed [and hence clamorous to be led to safety] by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary”, H. L. Mencken.

"I can spend your money better than you can", Bill Clinton

“History is a vast early warning system”, Norman Cousins

"No man's life, liberty, or property are safe while the congress is in session", Mark Twain

"The attractiveness of financing spending by debt issue to the elected politicians should be obvious. Borrowing allows spending to be made that will yield immediate political payoffs without the incurring of any immediate political cost", James Buchanan

"Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule - and both commonly succeed, and are right", H. L. Mencken

"Do not be fooled into believing that because a man is rich he is necessarily smart. There is ample proof to the contrary", Julius Rosenwald

"A government that is big enough to give you all you want is big enough to take it all away”, Barry Goldwater

"You don't make the poor richer by making the rich poorer", Winston Churchill

"There are 10**11 stars in the galaxy. That used to be a huge number. But it's only a hundred billion. It's less than the national deficit! We used to call them astronomical numbers. Now we should call them economical numbers", Richard Feynman

"Vote for the man who promises least; he'll be the least disappointing", Bernard Baruch

“We have the best Congress money can buy”, Will Rogers

“Governments last as long as the undertaxed can defend themselves against the overtaxed”, Bernhard Berenson.

“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, subsidise it”, Ronald Reagan

"If God had wanted us to vote, he would have given us candidates", Jay Leno

“I have come to the conclusions that politics are too serious a matter to be left to the politicians”, Charles de Gaulle

“A holding company is a thing where you hand an accomplice the goods while the policeman searches you”, Will Rogers.

"A democratic government is the only one in which those who vote for a tax can escape the obligation to pay it", Alexis de Tocqueville

"Only in American banks can you find the pens chained to the counter and the doors wide open", Branden Kerr

"In all recorded history there has not been one economist who has had to worry about where the next meal would come from", Peter Drucker

“The first lesson of economics is scarcity: There is never enough of anything to satisfy all those who want it. The first lesson of politics is to disregard the first lesson of economics”, Thomas Sowell

“A lot has been said about politicians; some of it complimentary, but most of it accurate”, Eric Idle

“An economy hampered by restrictive tax rates will never produce enough revenue to balance our budget, just as it will never produce enough jobs or enough profits”, John F. Kennedy

“High finance isn't burglary or obtaining money by false pretenses, but rather a judicious selection from the best features of those fine arts”, Finley Peter Dunne.