cobb's rules

 

 

I know a few things...

 

 

"The most important thing in life is to be free to do things. There are only two ways to insure that freedom — you can be rich or you can you reduce your needs to zero."
--John Boyd

cobb is michael bowen

 

"Humankind still lives in prehistory everywhere, indeed everything awaits the creation of the world as a genuine one... if human beings have grasped themselves, and what is theirs, without depersonalization and alienation, founded in real democracy, then something comes into being in the world that shines into everyone's childhood and where no one has yet been -- home."
--Ernest Bloch
"..woncha tell someone to meet me, I'm comin...home."
--Phillipe Wynne
All you are ever told in this country about being black is that it is a terrible, terrible thing to be. Now, in order to survive this, you have to really dig down into yourself and re-create yourself, really, according to no image which yet exists in America. You have to impose, in fact - this may sound very strange - you have to decide who you are, and force the world to deal with you, not with its idea of you
--James Baldwin
"Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men's blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans. Aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will not die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing, asserting itself with ever-growing insistency. "
-- Daniel Hudson Burnham
"The fundamental role of the public intellectual - distinct from, yet building on, the indispensable work of academics, experts, analysts, and pundits - is to create and sustain high-quality public discourse addressing urgent public problems which enlightens and energizes fellow citizens, prompting them to take public action."
-- Cornel West
"I cherish the twilight. I maximize, my soul is the right size. I look for the power to run out on the moon, and that'll be sometime soon"
-- Kelvin Mercer
"When there is no hero, you be the hero."
-- Rabbi Hillel
 
  1. A little bit of everything adds up to a whole lot of nothing.
  2. There is Marriage, and there is everything else.
  3. Talk what you know, and don't mumble.
  4. Civilization is where you put it.
  5. Don't second guess people.
  6. Always have stretch goals.
  7. Never trust anyone whose shoes cost more than your whole day's pay.
  8. An enemy is someone who doesn't mind if you fail.
  9. It's better to be the King of a small hill, than a Prince at a higher elevation.
  10. An early start beats fast running.
  11. Perfect is the enemy of good.
  12. The Planet is fine.
  13. None of your ideas are any good until somebody else can take advantage of them without your permission.
  14. When people are confused, they overuse their strengths.
  15. If the poor and oppressed knew how to work the system, they wouldn't be poor and oppressed.
  16. Never underestimate the intelligence of people in power.
  17. Information isn't power. Power is power.
  18. The great illusion of Progressivism is that the middle class can make the poor into the middle class.
  19. If you really care about others, then you would be trying to get them to think and behave the way you do.
  20. Children are stupid and uncivilized. Anybody who thinks otherwise is, by definition, a child.
  21. If someone has bad breath, tell them.
  22. Marketing is the art and science of redefining common sense for a profit.
  23. Internet links are weak links.
  24. Only be a fan of the dead.
  25. You ultimately get the audience you deserve.
  26. Don't tell 'em what you're going to do. Tell 'em what you've done.
  27. It's very dangerous to rhetorically cross a man who masters nothing else but rhetoric.
  28. If you're not going to knock it out, don't get in the ring.
  29. It's a vice when nice won't suffice.
  30. There is always bacteria, and bacteria never sleep.
  31. Give a man a fire and he’ll be warm for one night. Set a man on fire and he’ll be warm for the rest of his life.
  32. If it barks at everything, it's not a watchdog.
  33. Mass democracy is just mass markets for things that actually shouldn’t be bought & sold.
  34. Obsession with outliers = disrespect for the common man.
  35. Zero tolerance requires infinite policing.

 

Corollary Wisdom

Social justice is crowd-sourced law, the whining little sister of mob rule.

Wisdom is the ability to describe the complex and make it appear so obvious that it becomes boring.

What do you give a man who has everything? An irresistable opportunity to throw it all away.

The Devil's Advocate only argues because he is disgusted and contemptuous.

No matter where you park your car, the birds will always find it.

If what you’re advocating is truly not hurting anybody, why can’t you shut up about it?

How to Handle Black People: A Beginner's Manual

 

back