Nobody performs her or his duties. Governments do not, because they do not know, they are not able or they do not wish, or because they are not permitted by those who effectively govern the world: The multinational and pluricontinental companies whose power — absolutely non-democratic — reduce to next to nothing what is left of the ideal of democracy. We citizens are not fulfilling our duties either. Let us think that no human rights will exist without symmetry of the duties that correspond to them. It is not to be expected that governments in the next 50 years will do it. Let us common citizens therefore speak up. With the same vehemence as when we demanded our rights, let us demand responsibility over our duties. Perhaps the world could turn a little better.
quote by Jose Saramago
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Related quotes
My Bird Performs
(colin moulding)
Fine art never moved my soul
No vintage wine designer clothes
But my world shakes for me
My bird sings sweetly
A different kind of tinsel
Decorates my tree
Yes my bird performs
A thousand cheshire cats
Grin inside of me
Yes my bird performs
There she goes
Shakespeares sonnets leave me cold
The drama stage and the high brow prose
But my world shakes for me
My bird sings sweetly
The brightest fireworks
Are lighting up my sky
Yes my bird performs
The cage is open
But shes no desire to fly
cause my bird performs
There she goes
And you keep saying what you got
You keep saying what you got
Look out!
song performed by by Xtc
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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My Bird Performs
(colin moulding)
Fine art never moved my soul
No vintage wine designer clothes
But my world shakes for me
My bird sings sweetly
A different kind of tinsel
Decorates my tree
Yes my bird performs
A thousand cheshire cats
Grin inside of me
Yes my bird performs
There she goes
Shakespeares sonnets leave me cold
The drama stage and the high brow prose
But my world shakes for me
My bird sings sweetly
The brightest fireworks
Are lighting up my sky
Yes my bird performs
The cage is open
But shes no desire to fly
cause my bird performs
There she goes
And you keep saying what you got
You keep saying what you got
Look out!
song performed by by Xtc
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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No president who performs his duties faithfully and conscientiously can have any leisure.
quote by James K. Polk
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A soul preoccupied with great ideas best performs small duties.
quote by Harriet Martineau
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A soul occupied with great ideas performs small duties.
quote by Harriet Martineau
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The governments of the present day have to deal not merely with other governments, with emperors, kings and ministers, but also with the secret societies which have everywhere their unscrupulous agents, and can at the last moment upset all the governments' plans.
quote by Benjamin Disraeli
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Aya
Why should there be rich people in my country and,
The government still go begging?
Why should many people put on gold chain and,
Still say that they are hungry?
I do not understand it because,
I am Aya in the land of the poor.
Ten years of love and ten years after,
And of the governments begging left and right;
But if it looks like an apple and tastes like an apple then,
It is an apple!
Twenty years of love and twenty years after,
And my people are still hungry with gold chains around their necks!
I still do not understand it.
How long will you stay in poverty with these gold chains around you?
How long will you keep on begging with all these rich people around?
I still do not get it;
For many people are still sleeping under the bridges!
And their governments clam to have rule over them.
If it looks like a woman and performs like a woman then,
It is a woman!
For the blood has stopped and the soldiers are advancing in;
And i need a cover to safegard myself in this world.
I cannot count the stars in the heavens above,
But do give me some water to quench my thirst;
For i am from Ur with love and,
I am prepared to visit my people in the village of love.
poem by Edward Kofi Louis
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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If Wise Women Led Governments
If wise women led Governments it would seem to me
We would not hear of wars and less talk of poverty
For war would become extinct and poverty would be on the decrease
And we would be on our way to a lasting World peace,
The women in Governments play the games of men
To cause division for them is a sure way to win
Support for their power base by their spreading of fear
Of those seen to be different positive things from them we don't hear,
Though no shortage of wise women in the big world out there
Wise women in politics for to say the least rare
Perhaps only cynical women in politics can hope to survive
In a game where negativity and cynicism is very much alive
And if wise women led Governments there would not be wars and terrorism and less of poverty
And far more compassion and understanding that leads to harmony.
poem by Francis Duggan
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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To administer is to govern: to govern is to reign. That is the essence of the problem.
quote by Honore Gabriel Riquet
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Clever and attractive women do not want to vote; they are willing to let men govern as long as they govern men.
quote by George Bernard Shaw
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Nations it may be have fashioned their Governments, but the Governments have paid them back in the same coin.
quote by Joseph Conrad
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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In all history there is no war which was not hatched by the governments, the governments alone, independent of the interests of the people, to whom war is always pernicious even when successful.
quote by Leo Tolstoy
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Democracy shows not only its power in reforming governments, but in regenerating a race of men and this is the greatest blessing of free governments.
quote by Andrew Jackson
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Not being able to govern events, I govern myself.
quote by Michel de Montaigne
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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In this context the British and Irish governments will have to promote a new, imaginative and dynamic alternative in which both governments will share power in the north.
quote by Gerry Adams
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Atlas was permitted the opinion that he was at liberty, if he wished, to drop the Earth and creep away; but this opinion was all that he was permitted.
quote by Franz Kafka
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Stress
Governments are always issuing
health warning on this and that,
but they never put one
on themselves.
Stress related illnesses
kill more people in the world today,
but consecutive governments
refuse to acknowledge any blame.
They blame it on rising prices
they say they cannot control,
and then they raise the taxes
putting everyone under
even more strain.
Don’t they ever realise
that their greedy taxes
are nearly always to blame.
15 July 2008
poem by David Harris
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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You know, it's not the world that was my oppressor, because what the world does to you, if the world does it to you long enough and effectively enough, you begin to do to yourself.
quote by James A. Baldwin
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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