“The best that we can do is to be kindly and helpful toward our friends and fellow passengers who are clinging to the same speck of dirt while we are drifting side by side to our common doom.”

(-; I like it ;-) Law enforcement is an oxymoron and only used in tyrannical societies. Compelled compliance, license, victimless crimes, and larceny with impunity are all despotic actions against those who are not our friends.

He had me until the end; death and doom are not synonymous.

Mike is saying that society by its very nature is tyrannical since all societies have law enforcement. Of course we always knew of Mike's warped mind set. Justin is right, going home to be with our parents at the end of this wonderful life certainly is not doom.

Forgot the stars, kindly and helpful are good.

I even try to be nice to liberals but it ain't easy.

Waffler, you don't have a clue what I said above, what it means, what law is (Constitutionally germane Laws of Nature and of Nature's God ), or how government is an extension of the individual sovereign. Your assertion was incorrect. All societies that I am aware of have tyranny enforcement, not law enforcement. In the de jure States united, the sovereign's representatives were to uniquely address that which concerned individual life, liberty, and property. The individual's self expression (law) concerning life, liberty, or property can not be infringed upon by self (example: can't steal from self) thus can not be enforced. The individual lawfully can not delegate that which he dose not possess. So, a government of, by and for people, as their representative can not enforce law - that is an oxymoron. When a second person becomes involved, life, liberty, and property may be infringed upon. Since law enforcement can not lawfully or legitimately be delegated, administrations of justice are enacted. Waffler, I know that is way over your head or capability to grasp (you having little to no understanding of true freedom, liberty, or inalienable rights) but, it is almost a scratch in the surface of what I was saying.

Excellent quote -- a good balance of positive and negative world views.

If it were not for great liberals like Clarence Darrow, we would all be serfs scratching for our very lives while the super rich laugh at our ignorance to know the difference between truth and what is ridiculous demagoguery and superstition. And while I'm at it, one of the supertitions I'm writing about is an afterlife where we'll all be reunited and live on easy street.

This is what I am exactly saying, helping others is profitable, not in the economic sense but the good sense.

Laura, you have given this quote five stars for the same reason I have given it one. The positive worldview expounded is false unless you assume kindly and helpful to mean in the context of a business transaction which I am sure the author is not. And the negative worldview expressed is false (for me) in that it violaes my own moral code.

Anonymous immediatly above, your words appear to have been spoken by one of the villains from an Ayn Rand novel. Making a profit is profitable, both for onesself and for others. Your "good sense" sounds like pure evil to me.

Dick, we are serfs and men like Mr. Darrow helped to hasen our grandfathers into that slavery. As for your idea of an afterlife it sounds like a frightening nightmare. I like to think that the afterlife is a place where we will be able able to work without ever having to worring about more than two-thirds of our lives (in labor) being confiscated from us. Also, I like to think I will be able to chose with whom I will be reunited. No wonder liberals fear death so much if they think it entails the type of afterlife you describe. An afterlife without purpose is even worse than a life without prupose.

Waffler, if you explain to me why kindly and helpful are good I will forgive you the two stars.

Jim, please, stop being nice to them. If their intent is to take what is yours for the "common good" treat them as you would any petty crook.

Justin I really do not know that I can explain it to you. Is the opposite mean and hurtful? Would you prefer living in a world where people did not hold the door and the elevator for each other? Would you prefer having doors slammed in your face and to be treated by all others as if you did not exist? Mike don't get upset, I never understand what you mean.

Waffler, (OK with me, good enough)

Waffler, Kindliness or helpfulness are too often used to mask bad intentions. I will do business with an honest man who does not put on airs over a master of civility and larceny any day.

The kindly and helpful comment is nothing more than a facade to cover the real intention of redistribution of wealth. We are all here together, true, but it is what we do with our lives that matters. This is not just a "piece of dirt." We are blessed with living in the greatest country on earth with everyone having the same opportunities. Last but not least, we are not heading toward our doom. Those that believe this quote are woefully lacking in any faith in a supreme being, a higher power, a God if you will, that gives meaning to our existence and guides our life with an innate sense imbued in us all. It is only our free will that damns us to the doom Darrow describes. This is a very negative quote.

perfect

Carol, "everyone does (not) all have the same opportunities." For some reason there are those who can overcome great adversity but they climb from a much lower level while some start near at the top. Race, experience, family status, education and even gender have a great bearing on how "same" we actually can attain. The writer is referencing the common doom to be "death", which no one escapes, not even you. I think he wants us all to be kind and accommodating to one anther since we are all "human" and have many of the same vulnerabilities, like health problems. Maybe he would feel we should have a health care that would deny no one treatment.

I really cannot believe Carol thinks kindly and helpful has to do with redistribution of wealth. Does that mean Carol that if you do not wish to have wealth redistributed you must be the opposiste of kind and helpful in order to protect you and yours. Does that mean you must be mean and hurtful to as many as possible. And the meaner and hurtful you are and the more folk you hurt the better off and less distributed your wealth may become. Is that what you are trying to say Carol?

Watch the movie "Inherit The Wind" with Spencer Tracy playing the part of Clarence Darrow. Very intertaining and instructive. 

Darrow was a thug, who found a way to profit off the ignorance of hatred, through deception.