Political Quotes - Page 202

The traits in career politicians the public detests most are produced when ego triumphs over principle.

The founding fathers never once rationalized getting in power and having control so they could stay in power.

It is easy to see how after receiving this adoration for a term or two most members become convinced they are indispensable.

Careerism in Washington "goes to the heart of what's wrong in America right now."

There is a long and honorable tradition of citizens in service to their nation that goes back at least as far as Cincinnatus, the Roman citizen who, more than once answered his country's call, then returned to his farm and his family and his work.

There are more facts and more truths told in the first eight minutes of The Daily Show than most political news conferences in Washington.

By contrast, China is a repressive regime that denies its citizens the essential freedoms of religion, political dissent and representative self-government.

I'm not a political guy. I've been a Democrat my whole life, but that didn't mean I went in and just pulled the Democratic ticket.

I do suppose what any political satire, what any political joke can count as a gaffe or a possible career-ending move. It changes what counts. I don’t know, I do feel like day to day even though Trump is so terrible and ridiculous, day to day we still laugh at Jason Chaffetz and we still laugh at Ted Cruz and we still laugh at those guys, at just how bad they are at their jobs.

I find Chinese debates about their political system domestically, but also about China's claims in the international system, to be among the most original and surprising and exciting of our time. The starting point is a system that none of us had anticipated, which I call Leninist capitalism, but also obviously because it is the most important emerging power. The question of China's relations with the United States in particular, and the rest of the world in general, is the question of war and peace in the 21st century.

The case for industry breakups comes from Thomas Jefferson's idea that occasional revolutions are important to the health of any system. As he wrote in 1787, “a little rebellion every now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical one.

I give the president credit for at least one thing. He's proven that someone can deserve a Nobel prize less than Al Gore.

You can stick a fork in Barack Obama. Politically, he's done. The main way we can screw this up is if we choose the wrong Republican.

Chevy Chase had been a bad boy with a drug problem, and had never really realized his potential. Fletch was the first movie he sort of straightened up on. And Michael Ritchie was Harvard-educated, 6'6", a brilliant director and political thinker. He was the guy the studio thought could handle Chevy, and keep him in check. And he could.

We are making fun of stuff. It is subversive, I think, and in many ways political. It's a reaction against the society we live in, very much so. When we make a commercial for a product that doesn't do anything.

Our political process appears to be a toxic dance of mutually assured destruction that takes all the citizens down with you, and that can't be right. So I've prepared a little experiment.

I probably will have to become more political down the road when my playing days are done, because I'm going to have to have the support of others to grow my foundation.

Politicians are leeches, mostly.

A public role endures for the literary high-command, as sages and seers, speaking out on social and political issues.

I don't think you want to preach to people. I don't think In A Valley Of Violence, and the same with The Sacrament, there's a social commentary and a political element to both the films, but it's not like, "Think this because I think this."

Anyone who does not understand the utter cynicism of politics does not understand politics.

People in the political world have every incentive to say things that lead voters away from a clear economic understanding of issues. What has happened more and more is that organized groups have more and more reasons to say things that don't make any economic sense.

The domestic power structure - how power is exercised in the United States, for instance - greatly influences the structure of international institutions. So, for example, the Clinton administration was very influential in shaping the WTO treaty, and, because of the way the US domestic political system works, this meant that corporations could use the US government to wield a huge influence.

Our Supreme Court has lifted the practice of buying legislation to the level of a constitutional principle by repeatedly protecting corporate spending for and against political candidates, as well as promises and threats of such spending to bribe and blackmail such candidates, by appeal to the free-speech clause of the First Amendment.

To live with our enemies as if they may some time become our friends, and to live with our friends as if they may some time become our enemies, is not a moral but a political maxim