On Manuel L. Quezon’s famous phrase
“I would rather have a government run like hell by Filipinos than a government run like heaven by Americans.” A phrase embodied by much wisdom and truth. Many thanks to Manuel L. Quezon III for the excellent article (see “That most famous phrase,” 10/15/25), which often made me smile while reading it.
Couldn’t this sentence still be applied today to citizens of Canada or Greenland? According to United States President Donald Trump, both are set to become the 51st and 52nd states of the US, respectively.
Unfortunately, there’s just one problem: according to current polls, an overwhelming majority of citizens of these countries want to remain independent and under no circumstances join the US as a federal state. Trump’s dream is over. The only option would be the violent military occupation of Canada and Greenland and their annexation to the US.
I no longer see myself as French or German, but primarily as a European, and I value our cultural diversity. There’s no need to be afraid of foreigners if you know them. Freedom of speech is slowly being restricted in the US. You can see it in the struggle of elite universities like Harvard and Princeton; they don’t want to be dictated by the government as to what they should and shouldn’t teach. Every opinion is legal.
The feminist Rosa Luxemburg once said in 1917, during World War I: “Freedom is always the freedom of those who think differently.” What arguments can be offered against this? A German folk song that was banned under Hitler went like this: “Thoughts are free! Who can guess them? I think what I want and as is fitting. And if they lock me up in a dark dungeon, all that is purely futile. For my thoughts tear the barriers and walls apart.”
Thoughts are free! You can’t ban an idea, and you can’t imprison thoughts. A quote from Fidel Castro says, “Only a free person can think freely. But no one is free as long as they are enslaved by hunger, ignorance, or exploitation. Colonialism plundered our peoples, degraded our cultures, and stole our history.” Today, we live in a world where the old colonial masters wear new masks, yet we shouldn’t fall for them. The Philippines for the Filipinos.
Jürgen Schöfer,
