Merle Haggard Quotes

We need to have music that contributes to the well-being of the spirit. Music that cradles people's lives and makes things a little easier. That's what I try to do, and what I want to do. You don't want to close the door on hope.

By the time you get close to the answers, it's nearly all over.

Lay in the weeds and wait, and when you get your chance to say something, say something good.

Faith is the only way we're going to make it. None of us are smart enough to do it on our own.

I'll tell you what the public likes more than anything, it's the most rare commodity in the world - honesty.

Momma tried to raise me better, but her pleading I denied, and that leaves only me to blame, cause Momma tried.

I wish coke was still cola and a joint was a bad place to be.

Willie Nelson's the one who told me the reason it costs so much to get divorced is because it's worth it.

Keep your opinions to yourself. I think it's important that I stay neutral on politics and remain hard to understand. I don't want to be pigeonholed as conservative, liberal, independent or anything. I back the man for the things the man believes in, not whether it says "R" or "D" down there beside his name.

Running down on a way of life our fighting men have fought and died to keep. If you don't love it, leave it.

The only thing that I miss lately in all music is somebody that will put out a melody that you can whistle. It doesn't seem like there's anything happening like that.

A house without love ain't a home.

If I hear another line dance song I think I'm going to puke.

This is America. We're proud. We're not afraid of a bunch of terrorists. But this government is all about terror alerts and scaring us at airports. We're changing the Constitution out of fear. We spend all our time looking up each other's dresses. Fear's the only issue the Republican Party has. Vote for them, or the terrorists will win. That's not what Reagan was about. I hate to think about our soldiers over in Iraq fighting for a country that's slipping away.

If I had a choice, and there was a "Y" in the road, I would always take the one that was more fun as opposed to the one that might make me more money.

There's two or three kids out there trying to make good music, and the rest of them sound like it's been strained through some kind of white toast or something. It all sounds just too neat and perfect, with no surprise to it at all. No story, no nothing. It's like building cars, like an assembly line. It doesn't sound like anything that came from a guitar.

To be part of what you're singing about is somewhat painful. You've got to climb inside it all.

Stop rolling down hill like a snow ball headed for hell.

Hey, hey, the working man, the working man like me. I ain't never been on welfare, that's one place I won't be.

There's just a few people that call themselves stars can actually sit down with a guitar and sing you a song.

Staring at the world through the bottom of a glass, all I see is a man who's fading fast.

There's one thing I never did do, and that was stink.

We are under [government's] control, and if people don't realize that, they haven't looked around. And if they're not paranoid, they haven't thought about it.

When you get to readin' about where the music and John Steinbeck and all those people like that come from, the further you go the more interesting it becomes.

It's a long way from Graceland across Jordan to the Promised Land, but Jesus finally came to lead him home.