If Marxist theory dictates that the personal is always political, the rebuttal of both 'The Americans' and 'House of Cards' is that the political is always personal: the sum total of our collective needs and desires, vows and betrayals.
There are no consequences for Snowden breaking the law in Snowden's World. It's where his massively inflated ego dictates the rules and determines which he will follow.
Mostly, I'm in the very enviable position that no one dictates what I do.
My idea of freedom is that we should protect the rights of people to believe what their conscience dictates, but fight equally hard to protect people from having the beliefs of others imposed upon them.
My people are going to learn the principles of democracy, the dictates of truth and the teachings of science. Superstition must go.
My own personal popularity can have no influence over me when the dictates of my best judgment and the obligations of an oath require of me a particular course. Under such circumstances, whether I sink or swim on the tide of popular favor is, to me, a matter of inferior consideration.
Process is your friend, but process also dictates what you can do.
Fracking is doable if there's full disclosure of all chemicals used. Secondly, science dictates the policy rather than politics. Third, there's collaboration between environmental groups and the natural gas industry.
However unattractive, pre-nups are at least a way round a law that dictates simply because you love someone and share their bed, that person has a claim on everything you own.
Music commands how we feel, dictates what we experience in our feelings.
The equipment you've got really dictates what you're going to do. When I started touring, there were no monitors, so I had to take the sound from the hall, and of course it was on a delay, so I would sing, and then I would hear it back, but later. It was very weird.
Safety from external danger is the most powerful director of national conduct. Even the ardent love of liberty will, after a time, give way to its dictates.
Here Fashion is a despot, and no one dreams of evading its dictates.
Dictates are futile, and mutual accusations are nothing but useless word games.
The response of anybody interested in liberty is that we all have a say and the ability to have an argument is exactly what liberty is, even though it may never be resolved. In any authoritarian society the possessor of power dictates, and if you try and step outside he will come after you.
Our morality is based on so many factors: of where we were born, who we were born to, what values were instilled in us, what values we chose, the way that our lives have shaped us. That dictates so much of what we assume is our morality, and also the culture, all of these things.
In both our personal and professional lives, there are times when reality dictates that we must stand up and 'end' something. Either its time has passed, its season is over, or worse, continuing it would be destructive in some way.
A human society obeys the dictates of reason and is guided and governed by a respect for justice.
In any authoritarian society, the possessor of power dictates, and if you try and step outside, he will come after you. This is equally true of Sovietism, of China and of Iran, and in our time it has happened a lot in Islam. The point is that it's worse when the authoritarianism is supported by something supernatural.
When you work at a magazine, you have to tell the truth. When you're not working in that format, it's fun to see where your mind takes you when the dictates have nothing to do with anyone but yourself.
Man is a rational animal who always loses his temper when called upon to act in accordance with the dictates of reason.
Sometimes a time dictates what a film will be. Sometimes a film dictates what the time will be.
I've worked on films where the budgets are almost limitless and you're in trailers that are bigger than a hotel room. You're taken care of and the food is amazing, the quality of the job is amazing and then you work on smaller things but it never dictates my happiness or my willingness to go to work.
Every family should have the right to spend their money, after tax, as they wish, and not as the government dictates. Let us extend choice, extend the will to choose and the chance to choose.
By far, the most disabling thing in my life is the physical environment. It dictates what I can and can't do every day.
