Political Life Quotes

• Why, of course, the people don't want war.

  Hermann Goring

  War, Communist Leaders, Political Will

  Interview in Göring's jail cell, April 18, 1946. "Nuremberg Diary". Book by Gustave Gilbert, 1947.

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• The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders...tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger.

  Hermann Goring

  Country, Peace, Freedom

  Quoted in Gustave M. Gilbert, Nuremberg Diary (1947).

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• The time is fast coming when politicians will cease to fear the religion of humanity and humanitarians will find entrance into political life indispensable for full service.

  Mahatma Gandhi

  Political, Humanity, Politician

  Mahatma Gandhi (1967). “Collected Works”

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• The good of political life is the good of free and equal citizens recognizing the duty of civility to one another and supporting the institutions of a constitutional regime.

  John Rawls

  Political, Citizens, Life Is

  John Rawls, Samuel Richard Freeman (1999). “Collected Papers”, p.621, Harvard University Press

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• It is possible that the distinction between moral relativism and moral absolutism has sometimes been blurred because an excessively consistent practice of either leads to the same practical result — ruthlessness in political life.

  Richard Hofstadter

  Moral Absolutism, Practice, Political

  Richard Hofstadter (2011). “The Age of Reform”, p.16, Vintage

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• The cities of America are inexpressibly tedious. The Bostonians take their learning too sadly; culture with them is an accomplishment rather than an atmosphere; their Hub, as they call it, is the paradise of prigs. Chicago is a sort of monster-shop, full of bustles and bores. Political life at Washington is like political life in a suburban vestry. Baltimore is amusing for a week, but Philadelphia is dreadfully provincial; and though one can dine in New York one could not dwell there.

  Oscar Wilde

  New York, Dine In, Philadelphia

  Oscar Wilde, General Press (2016). “The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde: Novel, Short Stories, Poetry, Essays and Plays”, p.1023, GENERAL PRESS

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• Oh how I wish he (Franklin Pierce) was out of political life! How much better it would be for him on every account!

  Jane Pierce

  Political, Wish, Would Be

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• It is an axiom of political life that you never raise expectations, whether in a political or military campaign, because your defeats are then magnified and your victories discounted.

  Charles Krauthammer

  Military, Interesting, Expectations

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• The plain truth is that labor is the chief representative force that keeps the real special interests from dominating American political life.

  Lane Kirkland

  Real, Political, Special

  "Robust Unionism: Innovations in the Labor Movement". Book by Arthur B. Shostak, p. 190, 1991.

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• I started my political life in the Resistance. It was there that I had my first responsibility.

  Francois Mitterrand

  Life, Responsibility, Political

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• Nothing becomes reality in the political life of a nation that was not present in its literature as spirit.

  Hugo von Hofmannsthal

  Life, Reality, Political

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• I guess I am nostalgic for a time - the nineteenth century and early twentieth - when writers were, to use Stefan Collini's phrase, "public moralists" and politicians, plutocrats, bankers, arms dealers, and experts and technocrats were not solely defining the moral norms as well as the political lives of our societies. We do have some writers claiming to be public moralists, but, as I said, they have actually been more jingoistic than even the henchmen of Bush and Blair.

  Pankaj Mishra

  Political, Bankers, Experts

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

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• I never imagined when I wrote my first book on Strauss that the unscrupulous elite that he elevates would ever come so close to political power, nor that the ominous tyranny of the wise would ever come so close to being realised in the political life of a great nation like the United States. But fear is the greatest ally of tyranny.

  Shadia Drury

  Wise, Book, Being Real

  "Noble lies and perpetual war: Leo Strauss, the neocons, and Iraq". Interview with Danny Postel, www.opendemocracy.net. October 15, 2003.

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• I understand the harsh feelings and sentiments from my opponents and their supporters because I myself have been defeated twice in my political life in the past and I understand very well it is hard to accept your own failure.

  Chen Shui-bian

  Past, Political, Feelings

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• The worst day of my political life was when President George W. Bush signed McCain-Feingold into law.

  Mitch McConnell

  Law, Political, President

  "Politicians Show Their Gratitude Where It Count$" by Bill Moyers, Michael Winship, www.huffingtonpost.com. September 3, 2014.

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• I believe that if something like a political life is to remain for us in this world of technology, then it begins with friendship. Therefore my task is to cultivate disciplined, self-denying, careful, tasteful friendships.

  Ivan Illich

  Believe, Technology, Self

  "Land of Found Friends". "We the People" radio program with Jerry Brown on March 22, 1996. Whole Earth Review, No. 90, www.aislingmagazine.com. Summer 1997.

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• The principle of my political life ... is that all amelioration and improvements in political institutions can be obtained by persevering in a perfectly peaceable and legal course, and cannot be obtained by forcible means, or if they could be got by forcible means, such means create more evils than they cure, and leave the country worse than they found it.

  Daniel O'Connell

  Country, Mean, Evil

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• When you've spent half your political life dealing with humdrum issues like the environment, it's exciting to have a real crisis on your hands.

  Margaret Thatcher

  Real, Issues, Hands

  On the Falklands campaign, 1982, in Chris Rose 'The Dirty Man of Europe'

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• In academic life, false ideas are merely false and useless ones can be fun to play with. In political life, false ideas can ruin the lives of millions and useless ones can waste precious resources. An intellectual's responsibility for his ideas is to follow their consequences wherever they may lead. A politician's responsibility is to master those consequences and prevent them from doing harm. Michael Ignatieff, a former professor at Harvard and contributing writer for the magazine, is a member of Canada's Parliament and deputy leader of the Liberal Party.

  Michael Ignatieff

  Fun, War, Party

  "Getting Iraq Wrong". www.nytimes.com. August 5, 2007.

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• The reduction of political discourse to sound bites is one of the worst things that's happened in American political life.

  John Silber

  Political, Sound, Propaganda

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• We demand of our political life greater certainty and greater perfection than we demand of our personal life.

  Max Lerner

  Perfection, Political, Demand

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• Liberal dominance of important areas of America's social and political life has undermined many of the virtues that have sustained this country.

  Mona Charen

  Country, America, Political

  Mona Charen (2006). “Do-Gooders: How Liberals Hurt Those They Claim to Help and the Rest of Us”, Sentinel

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• Ideas in a void have never appealed to me; action must follow thought or political life is meaningless.

  Oswald Mosley

  Ideas, Political, Void

  Sir Oswald Mosley (1968). “My Life”

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• Obama dreams of a society without power relations, without the agonism that constitutes political life. Against such a position one might assert that justice is always an agon, a conflict, and to refuse this assertion is to consign human beings to wallow in some emotional, fusional balm.

  Simon Critchley

  Dream, Emotional, Justice

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• My family helped start [this country], we've been in political life ... since the 1690s, and I have a very possessive sense about this country.

  Gore Vidal

  Country, Political, My Family

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