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"We were not treated by our own government as proper human beings and consequently, some outsiders did not regard us as the same kind of humans as themselves."
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"I never knew a government yet that wanted to do anything."

"Every form of government tends to perish by excess of its basic principle."

"An ideal form of government is democracy tempered with assassination."

"Government is a contrivance of human wisdom to provide for human wants. People have the right to expect that these wants will be provided for by this wisdom."

"I found this national debt, doubled, wrapped in a big bow waiting for me as I stepped into the Oval Office."

"The United States Constitution has proved itself the most marvelously elastic compilation of rules of government ever written."

"No more distressing moment can ever face a British government than that which requires it to come to a hard, fast and specific decision."

"I don't mind what Congress does, as long as they don't do it in the streets and frighten the horses."

"A democratic government is the only one in which those who vote for a tax can escape the obligation to pay it."

"Democracy is the form of government that gives every man the right to be his own oppressor."
Explore more quotes by Jung Chang

"What has marked Chinese society is its level of cruelty, not just revolutions and wars. We ought to reject it totally, otherwise in another upheaval there will be further cruelty."

"While I was writing Wild Swans I thought the famine was the result of economic mismanagement but during the research I realised that it was something more sinister."

"I think because of their terrible past, particularly this century, the Chinese have come to accept cruelty more than many other people, which is something I feel very unhappy about."

"I would love mainland Chinese to read my book. There is a Chinese translation which I worked on myself, published in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Many copies have gone into China but it is still banned."

"For anyone to open their heart, they need the right atmosphere, and something to prompt them. For my mother it was her trip abroad: she was in a very relaxed, understanding environment. I was very sympathetic towards her."

"If children were brought up to become non-conformists it would only ruin their lives. So parents all over China who loved their children told them to do as Chairman Mao said. It was not possible to tell them anything else."

"When I was in China, Mao was Chairman, and parents were terrified to tell their children anything that differed from the party line in case the children repeated it and endangered the whole family."

"The Chinese seemed to be mourning Mao in a heartfelt fashion. But I wondered how many of their tears were genuine. People had practiced acting to such a degree that they confused it with their true feelings."
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