Administration Quotes - Page 34

• A significant number of pages and sentences that the administration wants to keep in a classified status have already been released publicly, some of it by public statements of the leadership of the CIA and the FBI.

  Bob Graham

  Leadership, Numbers, Want

  4 Copy quote

• No form of government matters nearly as much as the spirit and intelligence brought to the administration of any form of government.

  Don Marquis

  Government, Matter, Spirit

  Don Marquis (1935). “Archy does his part”

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• I think Katrina is one more indication of how inefficient and corrupt this Administration is, and indicates the absolute lack of seriousness that [George W.] Bush has in making the government respond to the needs of the people. They are so separated from the lives of normal, low-income people that it never occurred to them that if you're poor and have no money, no car, that you can't leave.

  Bernie Sanders

  Thinking, Government, People

  Interview with Ruth Conniff, www.sharedhost.progressive.org. December 1, 2005.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• I campaigned for [Barack] Obama for more than a year. I was in Iowa, Minnesota, California, Arizona - just traveling around to help get the word out. It was such a huge, spirited campaign, and so positive. But you travel around to cities in the U.S. now and there's just this hopelessness that has set in. It makes it hard to understand why it seems so impossible to make any kind of progressive change with an administration that is seemingly progressive, or why we keep encountering such political roadblocks to change.

  Scarlett Johansson

  Years, Iowa, Cities

  Interview with Arianna Huffington, November 22, 2011.

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• It is essential for men of science to take an interest in the administration of their own affairs or else the professional civil servant will step in - and then the Lord help you.

  Ernest Rutherford

  Men, Essentials, Steps

  16 Copy quote

• Any civilized administration, however organized, prefers its own good to that of the people.

  Charles Fourier

  People, Civilized, Organized

  40 Copy quote

• This is not some alarmist Orwellian scenario; it is here, now, financed by $20 billion last year and $15 billion more this year of federal money appropriated out of sheer fear. By creating the means to monitor 300 million visits to the United States yearly, this administration and a supine opposition are building a system capable of identifying, tracking and spying on 300 million Americans.

  William Safire

  Mean, Years, Creating

  "The Great Unwatched" by William Safire, www.nytimes.com. February 18, 2002.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Under the Bush administration, openness and accountability have been replaced by secrecy and evasion of responsibility. They abuse their power, conceal their actions from the American people, and refuse to hold officials accountable.

  Edward Kennedy

  Responsibility, People, Accountability

  4 Copy quote

• The Great Society went wrong for three major reasons. First, the self-organization the Johnson administration promoted turned out to be not the pooling of family and community resources into shops and businesses, but political pressure for government handouts. Second, the Great Society failed to anticipate the perverse side-effects of handing money out to people who have done nothing to earn it. Third, while the Great Society was showering money on the poor, the Supreme Court was with childlike glee smashing to bits traditional methods of maintaining law and order.

  David Frum

  Self, Order, Law

  12 Copy quote

• Every GOP administration since 1952 has let the Military-Industrial Complex loot the Treasury and plunge the nation into debt on the excuse of a wartime economic emergency.

  Hunter S. Thompson

  Military, Debt, Emergencies

  Hunter S. Thompson (2011). “Fear and Loathing at Rolling Stone: The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson”, p.564, Penguin UK

  29 Copy quote

  Show source

• The Bush administration made us nostalgic for ... well, any other time in history.

  Hal Sparks

  Nostalgic, Made, Wells

  4 Copy quote

• A superpower that no longer stands for anything, that no one believes in anymore, that is seen only as a bully, will fall despite its military might. If the Bush administration ever wanted to reflect on history, it might think about this.

  Mark Kurlansky

  Military, Believe, Fall

  8 Copy quote

• You essentially have a human-relations database on millions of Americans. The administration said, "Well we're not listening to calls, we don't collect content." As [Vice President] Joe Biden said when he was a United States senator, you don't need to listen to those calls. If you have who somebody called, when and where, and you learned, for example, somebody called a psychiatrist three times in the last few days and twice after midnight, you know a lot about that person that they may not want people to know about them, especially the government.

  Ron Wyden

  Government, People, Listening

  "Stopping the 'Ever-Expanding Surveillance State'". Interview with Aj Vicens, www.motherjones.com. July 31, 2013.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Reagan was extreme. Beginning of his administration, one of the first things was to call in scabs - hadn't been done for a long time, and it's illegal in most countries - in the air controller strike.

  Noam Chomsky

  Country, Air, Long

  "Chomsky on the Wisconsin Protests". bigthink.com.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• I want you to know that this administration is motivated by a political philosophy that sees the greatness of America in you, her people, and in your families, churches, neighborhoods, communities - the institutions that foster and nourish values like concern for others and respect for the rule of law under God.

  Ronald Reagan

  Philosophy, Greatness, America

  Remarks at the Annual Convention of the the National Association of Evangelicals, delivered 8 March 1983, Orlando, Florida

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• Historically, things were moving in a pretty good direction until the Reagan presidency. And then it all got reversed. The Mexico City policy was instituted - the idea of wrecking the environment for this generation's profit and forgetting about our gets got firmly embedded. I'm sad to say the Clinton administration didn't turn it around and the Bush administration, well, I think they're the worst administration we've ever had, and I used to be a Republican.

  Paul R. Ehrlich

  Moving, Thinking, Cities

  "Q&A: Paul Ehrlich". Interview with Jesse Finfrock, www.motherjones.com. 2008.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• One of the principal factors fueling the proliferation of the abuse of secrecy and sensitive but unclassifieds is the administration's adherence to the unitary executive principal. This administration more than any of its predecessors believes that it is its responsibility to collect power onto itself in the executive office when it comes to the conduct of war, foreign policy, the management of agencies and departments, regulations, etc.

  Ted Gup

  War, Believe, Responsibility

  Source: www.motherjones.com

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• The third factor is the natural predisposition of bureaucracies, both governmental and private, to exploit secrecy to whatever degree they are licensed to do so, and in this administration they're given virtually carte blanche.

  Ted Gup

  Degrees, Natural, Secrecy

  Source: www.motherjones.com

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• And fourthly there is a major shift in public opinion and attitude to accommodate to the post-9/11 mentality and the Bush administration's penchant for secrecy. I think the public has simply become increasingly accustomed to being turned away from vital information and is protesting less and less. You have some squeaky wheels out there, but I don't think they're representative of the population at large.

  Ted Gup

  Attitude, Thinking, Public Opinion

  Source: www.motherjones.com

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• The press is going to have to learn anew that it's possible to work in an environment that is not so toxic and to readopt those kinds of techniques. The relationship between the press and the Clinton White House during the later period was not a healthy one. There was a lot of hostility and a lot of suspicion. This administration has done systematically what no other administration had done. They came in with a corporate mentality, an ability to stay on script that was without parallel.

  Ted Gup

  White, House, Healthy

  Source: www.motherjones.com

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Under the current U.S. policy, because of this power struggle, American oil companies can't do business with Iran. So I think the ultimate goal of the U.S. administration in Iran is regime change, to put into power a pro-Western government that will eliminate the strategic challenge to U.S. interests and, at the same time, allow the lifting of sanctions and allowing American oil companies to do business with Iran.

  Michael Klare

  Struggle, Thinking, Government

  "The Permanent Energy Crisis". Interview with Julian Brookes, www.motherjones.com. June 19, 2006.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Politkovskaya was a known critic of the administration. For this reason, one cannot rule out the possibility that someone would want to blame the government for the murder.

  Alexander Lebedev

  Government, Want, Blame

  Source: www.spiegel.de

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• ... The popular attitude toward the administration of justice should be one of respect and confidence. Bureaucratic, purely official justice, can never receive such confidence. The one way to secure it is to give the citizen-body itself a share in the administration of justice. And that is what jury-trial does.

  John Henry Wigmore

  Attitude, Giving, Justice

  11 Copy quote

• Those who serve upon our juries have maintained a standard of fairness and excellence and demonstrated a vision toward the administration of justice that is a wellspring of inspiration.

  Earl Warren

  Inspiration, Justice, Excellence

  7 Copy quote

• Sources say the Obama administration is in the 'final stages' of planning the closing of Guantanamo Bay. The way it's gonna work is, they're going to put a Radio Shack sign out front and let nature take its course.

  Jimmy Fallon

  Finals, Radio, Way

  4 Copy quote