Fine. Those are all good quotes. But you must have entirely missed the point of this article. The point is, these are random quotes with no citation.

You could have just made them up right now. Unless you cite your sources, quotations are worthless.

If those quotes “can be cited” than please cite them.

To be useful, a quote must be traceable to the original source. Anything else hurts the cause. Look at how much amunition the shennangians related to climate change data have given to the climate change deniers.

It is important first and foremost to be transparent and verifiable.

“What we have to fight for is the freedom and independence of the fatherland, so that our people may be enabled to fulfill the mission assigned to it by the creator”

“In actual fact the pacifistic-humane idea is perfectly all right perhaps when the highest type of man has previously conquered and subjected the world to an extent that makes him the sole ruler of this earth… Therefore, first struggle and then perhaps pacifism.”

I’d say its close enough. These ones can be cited.

It’s something that has always bugged me. One of the first arguments I got in on the internet concerned a quote from Martin Luther. The other guy said I was wrong because he had proof – The Oxford Book of Quotations, citing Luther’s speech before the Imperial Diet.

Sadly for him, my source was the original German proceedings of the Imperial Diet and an extended discussion on the quote from a biography of Luther. That pretty much settled that.

My latest, with much less political import than the Hitler/Bush thing is the “I would have written a shorter letter but I didn’t have the time.” That’s attributed to everyone from Mark Twain to Oscar Wilde to Pliny the Younger. The only one I can actually find is from Pascal

“Je n’ai fait celle-ci plus longue que parce que je n’ai pas eu le loisir de la faire plus courte.”

Blaise Pascal, Les provinciales, ou, Les lettres écrites par Louis de Montalte à un provinciale de ses amis et aux RR. PP. Jésuites Lettre 16 (1656), pp. 297-326 in the Garnier edition, Paris, 1965.

Yeah, okay. I’m kind of anal about this stuff. I guess it’s not by accident I became a historian.

Going back to your post, you make a great point, it’s really annoying when you find qoutes and “facts” with no reference at all. It’s even worse when people just believe it, and don’t question it for a second.

It’s good to know there are still people like yourself and your readers who aren’t completely blinded by the almighty internet.

Good work!!!

I’m doing research for a book about Vietnam and why we were there, incorporating quotes I’ve found. Many are un-sourced and no matter how applicable to my story I just can’t be a hypocrite. Keep up the good work.

As yet, though, I still don’t know the original source of the quotation, whether made up or accurate.

If anyone does find out where this came from originally, regardless of whether it was simply made up in 200x or comes from 1930s Germany, I would love to have this answered.

My search so far has taken me to your good site and to a piece by Jackson Thoreau on Opednews dot com in which he states that in his ‘…17th press conference’ President Bush speaking on the Budget says:

“We will submit a budget that fits the times. It will provide every tool and resource to the military, will protect the homeland, and meet other priorities of the government.”

The quote is from the conference of December 20, 2004 and a full transcript is available on the Whitehouse site as well rm audio versions on various other sites, which is the closest I can get so far.
‘Protect the homeland’. Sinister but no mention of evil etc.
My quest continues though.
It’s very disappointing really. These guys from Zeitgeist are purporting to expose propaganda and give a better insight into our common history. A worthy cause. But for me now I’ll have to check everything they say and then it doesn’t warrant the effort. When will they learn that the method is the message. You cannot expose lies with more lies