Martha Gellhorn Quote

It is not easy to be the citizen of a Superpower, nor is it getting easier. I would feel isolated with my shame if I were not sure that I belong, among millions of Americans, to a perennial minority of the nation. The obstinate bleeding hearts who will never agree that might makes right and know if the end justifies the means, the end is worthless. Power corrupts, an old truism but why does it also make the powerful so stupid? Their power schemes become unstuck in time, at cruel cost to other; then the powerful put their stupid important heads together and invent the next similar schemes [written 1987].

Martha Gellhorn

It is not easy to be the citizen of a Superpower, nor is it getting easier. I would feel isolated with my shame if I were not sure that I belong, among millions of Americans, to a perennial minority of the nation. The obstinate bleeding hearts who will never agree that might makes right and know if the end justifies the means, the end is worthless. Power corrupts, an old truism but why does it also make the powerful so stupid? Their power schemes become unstuck in time, at cruel cost to other; then the powerful put their stupid important heads together and invent the next similar schemes [written 1987].

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About Martha Gellhorn

Martha Ellis Gellhorn (8 November 1908 – 15 February 1998) was an American novelist, travel writer, and journalist who is considered one of the great war correspondents of the 20th century.
Gellhorn reported on virtually every major world conflict that took place during her 60-year career. She was also the third wife of American novelist Ernest Hemingway, from 1940 to 1945. She died in 1998 by apparent suicide at the age of 89, ill and almost completely blind. The Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism is named after her.