Quotable Quotes (33 page)

—
B
ILL
M
OYERS

in
Newsweek

 

Democracy is like a raft. It won't sink, but you'll always have your feet wet.

—
Quoted by R
USSELL
L
ONG
in
The Washingtonian

 

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.

—
M
ARK
T
WAIN

 

Sometimes a majority simply means that all the fools are on the same side.

—
C
LAUDE
M
C
D
ONALD

 

Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time.

—
E
.
B
.
W
HITE

in
The New Yorker

 

It's not the hand that signs the laws that holds the destiny of America. It's the hand that casts the ballot.

—
H
ARRY
T
RUMAN

 

It's not the voting that's democracy; it's the counting.

—
T
OM
S
TOPPARD

Jumpers

 

Anything that keeps a politician humble is healthy for democracy.

—
M
ICHAEL
K
INSLEY

 

Democracy is the art of disciplining oneself so that one need not be disciplined by others.

—
G
EORGES
C
LEMENCEAU

 

I
N POLITICS 
. . .

 

In politics, what begins in fear usually ends in folly.

—
S
AMUEL
T
AYLOR
C
OLERIDGE

 

The bedfellows politics makes are never strange. It only seems that way to those who have not watched the courtship.

—
K
IRKPATRICK
S
ALE

 

Politics has got so expensive that it takes lots of money to even get beat with nowadays.

—
W
ILL
R
OGERS

 

Politicians and journalists share the same fate in that they often understand tomorrow the things they talk about today.

—
H
ELMUT
S
CHMIDT

 

Politics is like coaching a football team. You have to be smart enough to understand the game but not smart enough to lose interest.

—
E
UGENE
M
C
C
ARTHY

 

No man should enter politics unless he is either independently rich or independently poor.

—
R
OBERT
J
AMES
M
ANION

Gentlemen, Players and Politicians

 

The idea that you can merchandise candidates for high office like breakfast cereal is the ultimate indignity to the democratic process.

—
A
DLAI
E
.
S
TEVENSON

 

Politics is perhaps the only profession for which no preparation is thought necessary.

—
R
OBERT
L
OUIS
S
TEVENSON

 

The truly skillful politician is one who, when he comes to a fork in the road, goes both ways.

—
M
ARCO
A
.
A
LMAZAN

Píldoras Anticonceptistas

 

What's real in politics is what the voters decide is real.

—
B
EN
J
.
W
ATTENBERG

Values Matter Most

 

Politics are too serious a matter to be left to the politicians.

—
G
EN.
C
HARLES DE
G
AULLE

 

Everything is changing. People are taking their comedians seriously and the politicians as a joke.

—
W
ILL
R
OGERS

 

When things don't go well they like to blame presidents; and that's something that presidents are paid for.

—
J
OHN
F
.
K
ENNEDY

 

Sincerity and competence is a strong combination. In politics, it's everything.

—
P
EGGY
N
OONAN

in
Catholic New York

 

When a man assumes a public trust he should consider himself as public property.

—
T
HOMAS
J
EFFERSON

 

Talk is cheap—except when Congress does it.

—
C
ULLEN
H
IGHTOWER

 

A strong conviction that something must be done is the parent of many bad measures.

—
D
ANIEL
W
EBSTER

 

Those who corrupt the public mind are just as evil as those who steal from the public purse.

—
A
DLAI
E
.
S
TEVENSON

 

When the search for truth is confused with political advocacy, the pursuit of knowledge is reduced to the quest for power.

—
A
LSTON
C
HASE

In a Dark Wood

 

A statesman who keeps his ear permanently glued to the ground will have neither elegance of posture nor flexibility of movement.

—
A
BBA
E
BAN

 

Congress is continually appointing fact-finding committees, when what we really need are some fact-facing committees.

—
R
OGER
A
LLEN

in
Grand Rapids Press

 

Asking an incumbent member of Congress to vote for term limits is a bit like asking a chicken to vote for Colonel Sanders.

—
B
OB
I
NGLIS

 

A politician without a prepared text is like a Boris Becker without a tennis racket, a dog biscuit without a dog, or opera glasses without an opera.

—
C
.
M
.
B
OWRA

 

When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the first things to be bought and sold are legislators.

—
P
.
J
.
O
'
R
OURKE

 

Now and then an innocent man is sent to the legislature.

—
K
IN
H
UBBARD

 

Election year is that period when politicians get free speech mixed up with cheap talk.

—
J
.
B
.
K
IDD

 

Politicians are like ships: noisiest when lost in a fog.

—
B
ENNETT
C
ERF

 

A politician is a person who can make waves and then make you think he's the only one who can save the ship.

—
I
VERN
B
ALL

in
Modern Secretary

 

Politicians say they're beefing up our economy. Most don't know beef from pork.

—
H
AROLD
L
OWMAN

 

Politicians are people who, when they see light at the end of the tunnel, go out and buy some more tunnel.

—
J
OHN
Q
UINTON

 

It's extremely difficult to build a political platform that supports candidates without holding up taxpayers.

—
H
AROLD
C
OFFIN

 

Washington is a place where politicians don't know which way is up and taxes don't know which way is down.

—
R
OBERT
O
RBEN

in
The Wall Street Journal

 

Politics is the art of getting money from the rich and votes from the poor, with the pretext of protecting one from the other.

—
Muy Interesante

 

Instead of giving a politician the keys to the city, it might be better to change the locks.

—
D
OUG
L
ARSON

 

To create a housing shortage in a huge country, heavily wooded, with a small population—ah, that's proof of pure political genius.

—
R
ICHARD
J
.
N
EEDHAM

The Globe and Mail
(Toronto)

 

When they call the roll in the Senate, the Senators do not know whether to answer “Present” or “Not guilty.”

—
T
HEODORE
R
OOSEVELT

 

I
F A GOVERNMENT COMMISSION HAD WORKED ON THE HORSE 
. . .

 

If a government commission had worked on the horse, you would have had the first horse that could operate its knee joint in both directions. The only trouble is it couldn't have stood up.

—
P
ETER
D
RUCKER

 

Bureaucracy is the art of making the possible impossible.

—
J
AVIER
P
ASCUAL
S
ALCEDO

 

I don't make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts.

—
W
ILL
R
OGERS

 

Governing a large country is like frying a small fish. You spoil it with too much poking.

—
L
AO-TZU

 

A little government and a little luck are necessary in life, but only a fool trusts either of them.

—P. J. O'R
OURKE

Parliament of Whores

 

Everyone wants to live at the expense of the state. They forget that the state wants to live at the expense of everyone.

—
F
RÉDÉRIC
B
ASTIAT

 

Government can't give us anything without depriving us of something else.

—
H
ENRY
H
AZLITT

in
The Freeman

 

Everybody wants to eat at the government's table, but nobody wants to do the dishes.

—
W
ERNER
F
INCK

 

When government accepts responsibility for people, then people no longer take responsibility for themselves.

—
G
EORGE
P
ATAKI

 

The mistakes made by Congress wouldn't be so bad if the next Congress didn't keep trying to correct them.

—
C
ULLEN
H
IGHTOWER

 

Useless laws weaken the necessary laws.

—
M
ONTESQUIEU

 

Bad laws are the worst sort of tyranny.

—
E
DMUND
B
URKE

 

You are better off not knowing how sausages and laws are made.

—Washington, D.C., adage

 

A country is considered the more civilized the more the wisdom and efficiency of its laws hinder a weak man from becoming too weak or a powerful one too powerful.

—
P
RIMO
L
EVI

Survival In Auschwitz

 

Government never furthered any enterprise but by the alacrity with which it got out of its way.

—
H
ENRY
D
AVID
T
HOREAU

 

A government is the only vessel known to leak from the top.

—
J
AMES
R
ESTON

in
The New York Times

 

Knowing exactly how much of the future can be introduced into the present is the secret of a great government.

—
V
ICTOR
H
UGO

 

It's every American's duty to support his government, but not necessarily in the style to which it has become accustomed.

—Quoted by Thomas Clifford

 

The best defense against usurpatory government is an assertive citizenry.

—
W
ILLIAM
F
.
B
UCKLEY
J
R.

Windfall: The End of the Affair

 

We should know everything we can about government — and the first thing we should know is what we're paying for it.

—
R
OBERT
F
ULFORD

Financial Times

 

Government investigations have always contributed more to our amusement than they have to our knowledge.

—
W
ILL
R
OGERS

 

It's one thing to call a spade a spade, but I wish my local social security office hadn't called the maternity benefit a lump sum.