Shahira Abouellail - Susan Bardocz - Ronald Reagan - Thomas Paine - Michael Pollan - Garry Wills - Theodore Roosevelt - Louise Slaughter - Imran Khan - Bob Woodward - Naomi Wolf - John Stuart Mill - John F Kennedy - Ken Burns TV -
We need to hold people accountable. We don’t do that in this country. Mubarak was untouchable for a long time. And then people got rid of him, and now the army is untouchable. So there’s always someone. We need to get to a point where nobody is beyond criticism, where nobody is untouchable. Shahira Abouellail
Consequences for society of lack of legal protection for scientists: block in information flow; depriving people of their democratic right to know; one-sided unbalanced debate; depriving people of their right to influence future; manipulation of public opinion; loss of democratic rights of calling wrongdoers to account; jeopardy of public health. Professor Susan Bardocz, Alternative View II conference, ‘The Sacking of Dr Putsztai’
For the independence of science this is a very dangerous situation. Accepting money from the biochemical industry which has aggressively set out to dominate life and society makes scientists and science the servants of multinational companies. As they are most of the time outside democratic control and accountability, these big corporations may threaten our democratic institutions and corrupt politicians, civil servants and scientists. ibid.
We must reject the idea that every time a law’s broken, society is guilty rather than the lawbreaker. It is time to restore the American precept that each individual is accountable for his actions. Ronald Reagan
A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody ought not to be trusted by anybody. Thomas Paine
Regulation is an imperfect substitute for the accountability, and trust, built into a market in which food producers meet the gaze of eaters and vice versa. Michael Pollan, In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto
Accountability is the essence of democracy. If people do not know what their government is doing, they cannot be truly self-governing. The national security state assumes the government secrets are too important to be shared, that only those in the know can see classified information, that only the president has all the facts, that we must simply trust that our rulers of acting in our interest. Garry Wills, Bomb Power: The Modern Presidency and the National Security State
We must hold to a rigid accountability those public servants who show unfaithfulness to the interests of the nation or inability to rise to the high level of the new demands upon our strength and our resources. Theodore Roosevelt, Strenuous Life
Honesty, integrity, and accountability, the values, which should be the hallmark of this government, have instead been thrown under the bus by an arrogant majority, casualties in a misguided campaign to shield from accountability those who abuse this House. Louise Slaughter
I feel an independent accountability commission should audit all government services. Imran Khan
It was accountability that Nixon feared. Bob Woodward
In a fascist system, it’s not the lies that count but the muddying. When citizens can’t tell real news from fake, they give up their demands for accountability bit by bit. Naomi Wolf
A person may cause evil to others not only by his actions, but by his inaction, and in either case, he is justly accountable to them for the injury. John Stuart Mill
The men who make power make an indispensable contribution to the nation’s greatness; but the men who question power make a contribution just as indispensable. Especially when that questioning is disinterested. For they determine whether we use power or power uses us. John F Kennedy
The army inspector-general would eventually that more than half of the 11,000 kills by the ninth infantry had been unarmed innocent civilians: no-one was ever held accountable. Ken Burns & Lynn Novich, The Vietnam War VII: Chasing Ghosts June 1968 – May 1969, PBS 2017