Tuesday, August 10, 2010

David Marshall in 1994

http://thinkhappiness.blogspot.com/2006/08/meeting-david-marshall-in-1994.html

 I've got nothing against money. I'd like to have money myself! I'd like to
 have a house and a garden and dogs and a car and a chauffeur but, look,
 I've got a flat. I've got a swimming pool attached to the flat. I've not
 even got a car but I use taxis. I have a dignified way of life without
 being wealthy.


 I don't see the necessity of owning a Mercedes-Benz and a swimming pool
 and a couple of mistresses. I think we've got our values all wrong.
 You know $96,000 a month for a Prime Minister and $60,000 a month for a
 minister. What the hell do you do with all that money? You can't eat it!
 What do you do with it? Your children don't need all that money.


 My children have had the best of education. In fact, I'm very proud of
 them. One of them is a senior registrar to two major hospitals in Oxford.
 Another of them is a consultant in European law to the Securities and
 Investment Board in the United Kingdom. They've had their education. There
 are no complaints.


 I never earned $60,000 a month or $90,000 a month. When I was Chief
 Minister, I earned $8,000 a month.


 Look, what is happening today is we are encouraged to and are becoming
 worshippers of the Golden Calf.


 We have lost sight of the joy and excitement of public service, helping
 our fellow men. The joy and excitement of seeking and understanding of the
 joy of the miracle of the living the duty and the grandeur. We have lost
 taste for heroic action in the service of our people.


 We have become good bourgeois seeking comfort, security. It's like seeking
 a crystal coffin and being fed by intravenous injections through pipes in
 the crystal coffin; crystal coffins stuck with certificates of your
 pragmatic abilities.