Anti-Climacus

QUOTE: Your happy Trotsky quotes for the day. As always, I'll assume y'all see the same connections when you read them as I did when I read them:

"Hitler's promises to remain on the terrain of parliamentarism (by the way: where is he now?), are of as much import as the promises, let us say, of Japanese imperialism not to employ poison gases in a war. To demand such promises is ridiculous, to hope for their fulfillment -- utterly stupid."

-from Interview with Montag Moren

"There is no greater crime in politics than that of hoping for stupidities on the part of a strong enemy...

There are seven keys in the musical scale. The question as to which of these keys is "better" -- do, re, or sol -- is a nonsensical question. But the musician must know when to strike and what keys to strike. The abstract question of who is the lesser evil -- Bruening or Hitler -- is just as nonsensical. It is necessary to know which of these keys to strike. Is that clear? For the feebleminded let us cite another example. When one of my enemies sets before me small daily portions of poison and the second, on the other hand, is about to shoot straight at me, then I will first knock the revolver out of the hand of my second enemy, for this gives me an opportunity to get rid of my first enemy. But that does not at all mean that the poison is a "lesser evil" in comparison with the revolver."

-from For a Workers' United Front