Political Quotes

“Yesterday, the People's Republic of China sentenced Jimmy Lai to 20 years in a Chinese prison. His crime? Freedom. He was an outspoken, pro-democracy journalist, and he was jailed for his reporting on government. At 78 years old, Jimmy Lai will likely die in jail. This is a tragedy for freedom in Hong Kong and the People's Republic of China--and one that reminds us that the work of liberty, the work of freedom, the sacrifice and the struggle required to maintain it are not cheap. Our Nation was built on a yearning for the kind of freedom from government repression and overreach that Jimmy Lai stood up against. And our democracy rests on a lot of different foundations, but at the core of all of it is a restraint on government power. A democracy rooted in free speech, freedom of worship, freedom of assembly, and a chance to have and hold our own ideas, to pursue our own dreams and our own lives, has also built strong bonds with allies around the world--bonds that have helped keep us safe and made us prosperous for decades. We have had dark chapters in our history, certainly: the McCarthy era, the Red Scare, periods when we were not as committed to free speech as we might be. But, historically, we have not persecuted and jailed those journalists who dared challenge the government.”