Jeff Greenfield Quotes

The niftiest turn of phrase, the most elegant flight of rhetorical fancy, isn't worth beans next to a clear thought clearly expressed.

More things in politics happen by accident or exhaustion than happen by conspiracy.

Well, politics is war, and in war, truth is the first casualty.

Men and women in my lifetime have died fighting for the right to vote: people like James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, who were murdered while registering black voters in Mississippi in 1964, and Viola Liuzzo, who was murdered by the Ku Klux Klan in 1965 during the Selma march for voting rights.

After immersing myself in the mysteries of the Electoral College for a novel I wrote in the '90s, I came away believing that the case for scrapping it is less obvious than I originally thought.

There are good people who are dealt a bad hand by fate, and bad people who live long, comfortable, privileged lives. A small twist of fate can save or end a life; random chance is a permanent, powerful player in each of our lives, and in human history as well.

In politics, Bugs Bunny always beats Daffy Duck. Daffy's always going berserk, jumping up and down, yelling. Bugs's got that sly smile, like he always knows what's up, like nothing can ruffle him.

If the court strikes down the Defense of Marriage Act, is that a 'liberal' result enabling gay couples married in states where gay marriage is legal to enjoy the same economic advantages that federal laws now grant to straight couples? Or is it a 'conservative' ruling, limiting the federal government's ability to override state power?

In every debate, whatever the format, whatever the questions, there is one and only one way to identify the winner: Who commands the room? Who drives the narrative? Who is in charge?

History doesn't turn on a dime; it turns on a plugged nickel.

This is part of the involuntary bargain we make with the world just by being alive. We get to experiences the splendor of nature, the beauty of art, the balm of love and the sheer joy of existence, always with the knowledge that illness, injury, natural disaster, or pure evil can end it in an instant for ourselves or someone we love.

Victory has 1,000 fathers; defeat has 1,000 kibitzers.

As a personal matter, I stopped voting more than a decade ago, on the grounds that it helped me as an analyst not to think about making a choice in the voting booth.

In another life, before taking the veil of journalistic purity, I practiced the black arts of a political operative, including 'debate prep.

I got into writing and thinking about politics because I was told there would be no math.

Protestations of indifference to higher office are hard to take seriously when the 'non-candidate' is busily engaged in testing the waters.

Television is one of the most fickle businesses that there are, you are in favour one minute and out the next.

A citizen at his home in Rockford, Illinois, or Boulder, Colorado, could read a newspaper, listen to a radio, or watch the round-the-clock coverage on television, but he had no way of connecting with those who shared his views. Nor was there a quick, readily available tool for an ordinary citizen to gather information on his own. In 1960, communication was a one-way street, and information was fundamentally inaccessible. The whole idea of summoning up data or reaching thousands of individuals with the touch of a finger was a science-fiction fantasy.

There is no such thing as political science, but there are tenancies so strong that they might as well be called laws of nature.

I grew up in New York City, where we played highly unorganized sports: stick ball, stoop ball, and the occasional game of baseball with no adult supervision.

If Obama's vision of the public sector is socialism, then so too were the visions of Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, John Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, and Richard Nixon.

For millions, Roger Ebert will be remembered as a writer and television personality who brought a sense of passion and excellence to his craft. For me, he is a man who fused joy and courage as few others ever have. My life was enriched by having such a friend; it is poorer for losing such a friend.

When an office-holder facing a multi-count indictment says that he has decided to spend more time with his family, the proper response is a horse-laugh. When an accused politician explains that a charge of corruption is 'really' an attack on his or her race, religion, ethnic background or gender, the odds that something felonious happened jumps.

Something about her eyes or voice has always suggested the hint of a free spirit, trapped in a Peck and Peck cage, dreaming of making rude noises at public gatherings of Republicans.

Think about one of the most powerful influences on a young child's life - the absence of a father figure. Look back on recent presidents, and you'll find an absent, or weak, or failed father in the lives of Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.