[Football] has nothing to do with fair play. It is bound up with hatred, jealousy, boastfulness, disregard of all rules and sadistic pleasure in witnessing violence: in other words it is war minus the shooting.

Then, like a shimmering disk too rich and clear to be described, the sun slipped over the horizon and lined everything with gold. It was like seeing the world being born, and we were the sole witnesses.

No person … shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law …- Fifth Amendment, United States Constitution

I am standing puzzled, unable to decide whether the veil is really being lifted, or lowered more firmly in place; whether I am witnessing a revelation or a more efficient blinding.

The prose,” Robespierre said. “It’s so clean, no conceits, no show, no wit. He means every word. Formerly, you see, he meant every other word. That was his style.

Our politicians, by their words and policies, either expand or contract the frontiers of freedom. We the people either monitor and encourage its progress, or witness and suffer its decline. (Scott L. Vanatter)

There's certainly an attitude in some measure of the conservative movement that I believe won't accept the legitimacy of any Democratic president, and I think Obama did fall victim to that - witness the 'birthers.'

We can come to look upon the deaths of our enemies with as much regret as we feel for those of our friends, namely, when we miss their existence as witnesses to our success.

For every group, malevolence is always somewhere else. Maybe we understand at this point in history that it can occur at night in darkened rooms where small children sleep. However, surely not in academia. Surely lying and deception do not occur among people who go to conferences, who write books, who testify in court, and who have PhDs.At one point I complained to a Florida judge that I was astonished to an expert witness lying on the stand [about child sexual abuse research]. I thought one had to tell the truth in court. I thought if someone didn't, she didn't get her milk and cookies. I thought God came down and plucked someone right out of the witness stand if he lied in court. I thought a lying expert witness would step out of court and get hit by a bus. A wiser woman than I, the judge's answer was, “Silly you."Confessions of a Whistle-Blower: Lessons Learned Author: Anna C. Salter. Ethics & Behavior, Volume 8, Issue 2 June 1998

But witnesses incur responsibilities, as anyone who has ever seen a traffic accident and had to go to court to testify, knows. In the new world of globally televised war crimes, the defence of 'not knowing,' or neutrality, will dissolve for everyone. To be a witness or bystander is not a value-free choice but, inadvertently, a moral position; and in this sense the 'guilt' of people who live with the memory of crimes committed by members of their families, or communities, has been unwittingly extended to everyone who watches appalling pictures on the news.