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Quote by Martin Luther King Jr.

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Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story

This book provides an in-depth look at the pivotal events surrounding the Montgomery Bus Boycott, highlighting the struggle for racial equality in the United States. It chronicles the experiences of African Americans in Montgomery, the boycott's impact on the city, and the broader implications of this pivotal moment in the civil rights movement. more

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Martin Luther King Jr.

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“Let’s call it what it is and let’s vote on these things. I think we’re in violation of both the spirit and the law of the Constitution by bombing a capital, blockading a country, and removing elected officials. We certainly wouldn’t tolerate it, nor would I if someone did it to us. Our founders debated extensively over which branch of government should have the power to declare or initiate war. Virtually unanimously they decided, and what was entered into the Constitution, was that the declaration or initiation of war would be the power of Congress. There are many advocates for an expansive notion of presidential power. They often argue that wars are not really wars, that they’re kinetic actions or drug busts. If you reverse the circumstances it becomes very difficult for these arguments to hold up. If a foreign country bombed our air defense missiles, captured and removed our president, and blockaded our country, would that be considered an act of war? Of course it would be an act of war. One-way arguments that don’t rebound, that you can’t apply to yourselves, that cannot be universally applicable, are bad arguments. If it’s not a war and we’re just going to define it away, then calling it a drug bust isn’t really an argument. It’s a ruse. Not a war is a ruse. It’s not a real argument. We do what we do because we have the force and the might, and because it’s in our interest. What if a foreign country indicts our president for violating a foreign law? Should we extradite our president, or should we be okay if they come in and get him by force? We would never allow that. The Office of Legal Counsel argument is that this wasn’t a constitutional war because not enough people died. But the problem is it isn’t the number. It happens in retrospect. Our founders gave Congress the power to initiate or declare war. If we have to wait to see the scope, nature, and extent, then the war has already been going on. It’s hard to vote to initiate a war that’s been going on. The definition of war is very important. Calling things kinetic action is a disservice to our soldiers. You weren’t really wounded in war; you don’t have a medal of honor for war; you have a medal of honor for a kinetic action. If our predicate is that we can remove someone because we say they weren’t really elected, you can see where it leads, and it leads to chaos. That’s why we have rules like the Constitution—so presidents can’t do whatever they want. This is the check and balance. For seventy years we’ve been going the wrong way. It isn’t just this president. It’s a debate worth having.”

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Author:Rand Paul
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“In childhood, overhearing everyday conversations among relatives about collectivization, famine, war, and political repression, I perceived these stories as curious — sometimes frightening — episodes my loved ones had endured. Although they belonged to a past not so distant, I felt them as something that had happened long ago, almost like events that occurred only slightly later than the fairy tales I loved so much. Much of what I heard I did not yet understand, but my young memory — still largely unfilled — carefully recorded these fragments of history, preserving events and facts deep within its silent annals.” — Volodymyr Shablia, Stone. Book One. Author's foreword Context note: This reflection from the author’s foreword shows how the collective trauma of the early twentieth century entered a child’s consciousness indirectly — through family conversations, half-understood words, and inherited memory. What first felt distant and almost mythical would later reveal itself as lived history, shaping both the author’s worldview and the moral foundation of the novel.”

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Book:Камінь. Біографічний роман. Книга перша. Перші кроки до світла та назад: Дитинство та занурення в ГУЛАГ.
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“His only means of discovering how his body functions is to take bodies apart, as a child might dismantle a mechanical toy. The child's aim is not to fathom the functions of mechanics itself, but to find answers to the riddle of its own existence. Analogously, the unresolved question that underlies the soldier male's impotent attempts to gain mastery over objects by tearing them apart, and thus rendering them knowable, seems to be that of the construction of his own self— a question which acquires tremendous explosive force in a body never rendered capable of experiencing itself in relation to other bodies. The soldier male cannot know what impels him to tear out his own entrails, what moves him to spill his own contents in an effort to discover what species of being he may be.”

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Book:Male Fantasies, Vol. 2: Male Bodies - Psychoanalyzing the White Terror
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“Маловтішне то заняття — штудіювати історію: розквіти держав на крові й падіння держав на крові, переможні криваві війни і криваві поразки, диктатори і полководці, гризня за владу, змови, замахи, самодурства царів... Дикість, кров, торжество егоїзму окремих осіб і цілих народів. Після війни перепочинок, доки діти виростуть у солдатів; після перепочинку — війна. Тоді людство видається мені нічним школярем: ледве встигнувши збагнути свої помилки, відмирає старе покоління, на зміну йому приходить молоде і починає ті помилки спочатку...”

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