You'll have such proof as exists. You are the only one responsible for your own wants. - Isaac Asimov

know. A fire eater must eat fire even if he has to kindle it himself.

"I don't like being helpless," said Trevize grumpily. "Who does? But acting like a bully doesn't make you less helpless. It just makes you a helpless bully."

The navy is much larger and many times more expensive than it once was. The armed forces are much better-paid, in order to keep them quiet. Unrest, revolts, and minor blazes of civil war all take their toll." "But it's been quiet under Cleon. And we've had fifty years of peace." "Yes, but soldiers who are well-paid would resent having that pay reduced just because there is peace. Admirals resist mothballing ships and having themselves reduced in rank simply because there is less for them to do. So the credits still go — unproductively — to the armed forces and vital areas of the social good are allowed to deteriorate. That's what I call decay. Don't you?