Political Quotations | Page 6

Tragedy is a tool for the living to gain wisdom, not a guide by which to live.

A lot of people who voted for Barack Obama expected and were led to expect something new in politics: a new tone of political discourse in Washington. And I think - I think they're disappointed, because Barack Obama is not a new kind of politician. In fact, he's an old Chicago politician.

When you see how the President makes political or policy decisions, you see who he is. The essence of the Presidency is decision-making.

Everyone's entitled to express their political beliefs. I don't presume to tell anybody who to vote for. I am comfortable telling people what my opinions are.

There's nothing in the First Amendment that even remotely talks about spending money for political contests, and to say that an individual can spend as much of his or her own money as he or she wants constitutionally without any limitation, I think is just absurd.

So, in some ways, the political songs tend to be a bit more like reportage, whereas the love songs tend to be like novels, you can pick them up off the shelf and go into them any time.

So that was Reagan's political problem. As a rancher in California, he was an environmentalist himself. But the President of the United States doesn't control everything that happens in Washington.

Giving subsidies is a two-edged sword. Once you give it, it's very hard to take away subsidies. There's a political cost to taking away subsidies.

If you search for poverty, you'll find it, often in the family. Why? Because the family makes this great investment, from which we all benefit, but for which no-one helps. We have to point the spotlight on the family, and make political choices that sustain the family.

People say, 'Gee, you don't really do political music.' Well, I sing a lot of songs about how men and women and lovers treat each other, and none of us want to be talked down to or belittled or ignored or disrespected... So I'm proud to be a feminist.

Living in Washington, you can't take politics too seriously. I draw the line at honesty. I have no time for political hacks who say things they don't believe because they get paid to.

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.

Political debate with liberals is basically impossible in America today because liberals are calling names while conservatives are trying to make arguments.

Affairs are easier of entrance than of exit; and it is but common prudence to see our way out before we venture in.

Who, then, will govern? The answer must be, Man - for we have no angels in the shape of men, as yet, who are willing to take charge of our political affairs.

The Prime Minister has an absolute genius for putting flamboyant labels on empty luggage.

Anti-Semitism has no historical, political and certainly no philosophical origins. Anti-Semitism is a disease.

The Republicans have put together serious detailed counter-proposals when we have objected to this administration's agenda. And so, I want to tell the President and remind him again, we're not voting no for political expediency. We've got our principles, and we're going to stand up and defend those.

There is a process of social and of political differentiation going on in the real working class all the time.

Those who have a lot of money in Greece invest in housing abroad. It's all immoral. The Greek crisis is structural, but also political.

I learned in business that you had to be very careful when you told somebody that's working for you to do something, because the chances were very high he'd do it. In government, you don't have to worry about that.

The 2004 Election marks the first time in modern political history that Republican voter turnout matched Democratic turnout in a presidential election year.

This is an area where North Carolina does excel. I have known more colorful North Carolina political figures than I have colorless ones.

I've seen many politicians paralyzed in the legs as myself, but I've seen more of them who were paralyzed in the head.

It is unnatural for a majority to rule, for a majority can seldom be organized and united for specific action, and a minority can.

The main essentials of a successful prime minister are sleep and a sense of history.

Hollywood has always been political. They consider it their right and duty to tell us what is politically good and right.

Lesbian humor isn't trying to sell anything, it doesn't have to sell out. Coming out as a lesbian onstage is still a very political act; if it weren't, more women would do it.

There was in Italy a hidden demand for a boring government which would try to tell the truth in non-political jargon.

Politicians like to tell people what they want to hear - and what they want to hear is what won't happen.

Americans have a lower opinion of Congress than they do of the NFL replacement refs, head lice, traffic jams, cockroaches and even the group to which yours truly belongs - Washington political pundits.

I have spent time discussing the American political system and current events in Taiwan with the junior diplomats, and they have repeatedly expressed their country's desire to avoid confrontation with China.

If the euro zone doesn't come up with a comprehensive vision of its own future, you'll have a whole range of nationalist, xenophobic and extreme movements increasing across the European Union. And, frankly, questions about the British debate on EU membership will just be a small sideshow compared to the rise of political populism.

The unforgivable political sin is vanity; the killer diet is sour grapes.

A mouse does not rely on just one hole.

The challenge is to lend conviction even to the voices which advocate views I find personally abhorrent, whether they are political Islamists or officers justifying a coup.

A straw vote only shows which way the hot air blows.

If you wish to avoid foreign collision, you had better abandon the ocean.

Of all my false identities, the strategies in my campaign to be accepted, being a sworn Republican is the hardest to explain. In my later political life, I can only be described as a Kennedy Democrat, eager to pursue equitable treatment for the least fortunate.

Politics: where fat, bald, disagreeable men, unable to be candidates themselves, teach a president how to act on a public stage.

The war on terror, if this is a war on terror, can only be won by a sincere regional and international cooperation. All have to believe they have something at stake and work together. In the absence of this it will become political and interest-oriented.

Though, with the ascendancy of Louis, the political power of the nobles finally came to an end, France remained, in the whole complexion of her social life, completely aristocratic.

I swear to the Lord, I still can't see, why Democracy means, everybody but me.

In some of the countries where we operate, there is a tradition of corruption, in which the political elites work with business in the framework of unsavory relationships.

I am politically incorrect, that's true. Political correctness to me is just intellectual terrorism. I find that really scary, and I won't be intimidated into changing my mind. Everyone isn't going to love you all the time.

In the spring and summer of 1989, a serious political disturbance took place in China.

Lawyers should not be charged with the same crimes as their clients. Trials related to political charges are not in accordance with human rights.

The friend of the present order of things condemns all political speculations in the gross.

There is no stopping the world's tendency to throw off imposed restraints, the religious authority that is based on the ignorance of the many, the political authority that is based on the knowledge of the few.

Globalization and free trade do spur economic growth, and they lead to lower prices on many goods.

Prosperity is necessarily the first theme of a political campaign.

A Conservative is a fellow who is standing athwart history yelling 'Stop!'

Give me the ready hand rather than the ready tongue.

The essence of lying is in deception, not in words.

Venezuelans have a long history. So we are able to listen to each other, to talk to each other. From here were born the liberators of the region, and they said before and after that process we have a culture of political action. We are not in despair. That's the image broadcast to abroad.

But I am not political in the current events sense, and I have never wanted anyone to read my poetry that way.

Some of my earliest political feelings were based on the anti-Japanese bubblegum cards I got. There were also Spanish Civil War bubblegum cards. Awful.

Only a knowledgeable, empowered and vocal citizenry can perform well in democracy.

The stage of the development of the productive forces determines the political and ideological superstructure of society which are crystallized into a system of social organization.

I believe - I'm not a political expert, but I believe there is a broad consensus, a middle ground if you will, that Democrats and Republicans, business people and workers can agree on, to get this - the economy growing faster, getting people back to work.

I won't say that the papers misquote me, but I sometimes wonder where Christianity would be today if some of those reporters had been Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Have you ever seen a candidate talking to a rich person on television?

When the business interests... pushed through the first installment of civil service reform in 1883, they expected that they would be able to control both political parties equally.

Indians today are governed by two different ideologies. Their political ideal set in the preamble of the Constitution affirms a life of liberty, equality and fraternity. Their social ideal embodied in their religion denies them.

The Vice-Presidency is sort of like the last cookie on the plate. Everybody insists he won't take it, but somebody always does.

Regardless of your political affiliation, most people agree that Ronald Reagan was an American icon. He was a president of national significance and for that reason he deserves an honor in the nation's capital.

If men understood domestic economy half as well as women do, then their political economy and their entire consequent statecraft would not be the futil muddle which it is.

People of all political persuasions - conservatives, moderates, and liberals alike - need to dedicate themselves once again to preserving the moral foundation of our society.

Pose a political threat to Business As Usual, and sooner or later, mostly sooner, someone will try to kill you.

Liberalism, austere in political trifles, has learned ever more artfully to unite a constant protest against the government with a constant submission to it.

Students now arrive at the university ignorant and cynical about our political heritage, lacking the wherewithal to be either inspired by it or seriously critical of it.

The New York Times editorial page is like a Ouija board that has only three answers, no matter what the question. The answers are: higher taxes, more restrictions on political speech and stricter gun control.

I love history because when you strip away the social and political aspects, it's really just a bunch of fun stories.

Being born, especially being born a person of color, is a political act in itself.

I enjoy being around people who disagree with me; and I enjoy being in non-political contexts and activities.

I look back on my liberal political beliefs with a sort of wonder - as another exercise in self-involvement - rewarding myself for some superiority I could not logically describe.

A politician is a person with whose politics you don't agree; if you agree with him he's a statesman.

I support Democrats and Republicans. And I'm telling you that the business community in this company is frightened to death of the weird political philosophy of the President of the United States. And until he's gone, everybody's going to be sitting on their thumbs.

Once upon a time my political opponents honored me as possessing the fabulous intellectual and economic power by which I created a worldwide depression all by myself.

Every nation in every region now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.

People didn't vote left or right in the election. They voted for putting an end to all the primitive political history.

After much prayerful consideration, I feel that I must say I have climbed my last political mountain.

One man's wage increase is another man's price increase.

One of our most noble political tasks is to open up trust.

It is not with architecture that one can disseminate any political ideology.

Machiavelli's teaching would hardly have stood the test of Parliamentary government, for public discussion demands at least the profession of good faith.

Most people who came here came for economic reasons or sometimes for religious or political reasons. I didn't have any of this. I came here, I liked it, I stayed. So I'm a pure American - even more than people who are born here - because I did it by choice as an adult.

The rights of one sex, political and otherwise, are the same as those of the other sex, and this equality of rights ought to be fully recognized.

I feel that the Christian experience and the Jewish one have much to give each other. If this open society continues and there is no return to political anti-Semitism, then this encounter, deeper than any theology, may happen.

I studied political science and international relations and had the intention of becoming a journalist or work in foreign affairs. I had no intention of making a film.

From the viewpoint of political power, culture is absolutely vital. So vital, indeed, that power cannot operate without it. It is culture, in the sense of the everyday habits and beliefs of a people, which beds power down, makes it appear natural and inevitable, turns it into spontaneous reflex and response.

I was raised on the values of speaking up and making a positive difference in a very political family that believed in the importance of public service.

There is little place in the political scheme of things for an independent, creative personality, for a fighter. Anyone who takes that role must pay a price.

Don't worry about polls, but if you do, don't admit it.

I want to be an advocate for the people who don't have time to read the newspaper... or the money to make a political contribution.

Religious power, which, as I have already said, frequently identifies itself with political power, has always been a protagonist of this bitter struggle, even when it seemingly was neutral.

For us, sons of France, political sentiment is a passion; while, for the Englishmen, politics are a question of business.

The new rage is to say that the government is the cause of all our problems, and if only we had no government, we'd have no problems. I can tell you, that contradicts evidence, history, and common sense.

Political freedom is a political reading of the Bible.

A lot of my idealism was frustrated by the end of the '60s because of the way things went with the assassinations and the sense that the political establishment was so fixed in its ways you couldn't change anything.