Motivational Quotes

Politics

Politics can be relatively fair in the breathing spaces of history; at its critical turning points there is no other rule possible than the old one, that the end justifies the means.

- Koestler, Arthur

Best Quotes about Politics

Therefore, the good of man must be the end of the science of politics.

Aristotle

It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give validity to his convictions in political affairs.

Albert Einstein

It is my settled opinion, after some years as a political correspondent, that no one is attracted to a political career in the first place unless he is socially or emotionally crippled.

Waugh, Auberon

A politician is one that would circumvent God.

Shakespeare, William

In the school of political projectors, I was but ill entertained, the professors appearing, in my judgment, wholly out of their senses; which is a scene that never fails to make me melancholy. These unhappy people were proposing schemes for persuading monarchs to choose favorites upon the score of their wisdom, capacity, and virtue; of teaching ministers to consult the public good; of rewarding merit, great abilities, and eminent services, of instructing princes to know their true interest, by placing it on the same foundation with that of their people; of choosing for employment persons qualified to exercise them; with many other wild impossible chimeras, that never entered before into the heart of man to conceive; and confirmed in me the old observation, that there is nothing so extravagant and irrational which some philosophers have not maintained for truth.

Swift, Jonathan

Nothing is so abject and pathetic as a politician who has lost his job, save only a retired stud-horse.

Mencken, H. L.

The essential ingredient in politics is timing.

Trudeau, Pierre Elliott

I do not deny that there may be other well-founded causes for the hatred which various classes feel toward politicians, but the main one seems to me that politicians are symbols of the fact that every class must take every other class into account.

Gasset, Jose Ortega Y

Politics has less to do with where you live than where your heart is.

Margaret Cho

10.

As far as the men who are running for president are concerned, they aren't even people I would date.

Ephron, Nora

11.

What is a democrat? One who believes that the republicans have ruined the country. What is a republican? One who believes that the democrats would ruin the country.

Bierce, Ambrose

12.

Since a politician never believes what he says, he is surprised when others believe him.

Gaulle, Charles De

13.

Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it whether it exists or not, diagnosing it incorrectly, and applying the wrong remedy.

Ernest Benn

14.

Some men change their party for the sake of their principles; others their principles for the sake of their party.

Churchill, Winston

15.

Did you ever notice that when a politician does get an idea he usually gets it all wrong.

Marquis, Don

16.

Let me just tell you how thrilling it really is, and how, what a challenge it is, because in 1988 the question is whether we're going forward to tomorrow or whether we're going to go past to the back!

Quayle, Dan

17.

When they call the roll in the Senate, the senators do not know whether to answer present or not guilty.

Roosevelt, Theodore

18.

I have simplified my politics into an utter detestation of all existing governments; and, as it is the shortest and most agreeable and summary feeling imaginable, the first moment of an universal republic would convert me into an advocate for single and uncontradicted despotism. The fact is, riches are power, and poverty is slavery all over the earth, and one sort of establishment is no better, nor worse, for a people than another.

Byron, Lord

19.

Politicians should never put themselves first: governments should put people first and all of us should put our country first.

20.

The trouble with practical jokes is that very often they get elected.

Rogers, Will

21.

Politics is perhaps the only profession for which no preparation is thought necessary.

Robert Louis Stevenson

22.

The end move in politics is always to pick up a gun.

Fuller, R. Buckminster

23.

Most people assume the fights are going to be the left versus the right, but it always is the reasonable versus the jerks.

Jimmy Wales

24.

The most successful politician is he who says what everybody is thinking most often and in the loudest voice.

Roosevelt, Theodore

25.

There is no sea more dangerous than the ocean of practical politics -- none in which there is more need of good pilots and of a single, unfaltering purpose when the waves rise high.

Huxley, Thomas H.

26.

The newspaper reader says: this party will ruin itself if it makes errors like this. My higher politics says: a party which makes errors like this is already finished -- it is no longer secure in its instincts.

Nietzsche, Friedrich

27.

Politics are now nothing more than means of rising in the world. With this sole view do men engage in politics, and their whole conduct proceeds upon it.

Johnson, Samuel

28.

People with high ideals don't necessarily make good politicians. If clean politics is so important, we should leave the job to scientists and the clergy.

Watanabe, Michio

29.

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.

Lester B. Pearson

30.

People who leave Washington do so by way of the box... ballet or coffin.

Pell, Claiborne

31.

The two maxims of any great man at court are, always to keep his countenance and never to keep his work.

Swift, Jonathan

32.

We are the trade union for pensioners and children, the trade union for the disabled and the sick... the trade union for the nation as a whole.

Heath, Edward

33.

Politics are such a torment that I would advise every one I love not to mix with them.

Jefferson, Thomas

34.

I hope the two wings of the Democratic Party may flap together.

Bryan, William Jennings

35.

A constitutional statesman is in general a man of common opinions and uncommon abilities.

Bagehot, Walter

36.

Most of us are conditioned for many years to have a political viewpoint -- Republican or Democratic, liberal, conservative, or moderate. The fact of the matter is that most of the problems that we now face are technical problems, are administrative problems. They are very sophisticated judgments, which do not lend themselves to the great sort of passionate movements which have stirred this country so often in the past. [They] deal with questions which are now beyond the comprehension of most men.

Kennedy, John F.

37.

In order to remain true to oneself one ought to renounce one's party three times a day.

Rostand, Jean

38.

Ignorance makes most men go into a political party, and shame keeps them from getting out of it.

Halifax, Edward F.

39.

Religion is organized to satisfy and guide the soul -- politics does the same thing for the body.

Cary, Joyce

40.

It is a vain hope to make people happy by politics.

Carlyle, Thomas

41.

If we choose only to expose ourselves to opinions and viewpoints that are in line to our own, we become more polarized, more set in our own ways. It will only reinforce and deepen the political divides in our country. But if we choose to actively seek out information that challenges our assumptions and beliefs, perhaps we can begin to understand where the people who disagree with us are coming from.

President Barack Obama

42.

A politician is a statesman who approaches every question with an open mouth.

Stevenson, Adlai E.

43.

The abjection of our political situation is the only true challenge today. Only facing up to this situation in all its desperation can help us get out of it.

Baudrillard, Jean

44.

There is no gambling like politics. Nothing in which the power of circumstance is more evident.

Disraeli, Benjamin

45.

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed [and Hence Clamorous To Be Led To Safety] by an endless series of hobgoblins.

Mencken, H. L.

46.

The two real political parties in America are the Winners and the Losers. The people don't acknowledge this. They claim membership in two imaginary parties, the Republicans and the Democrats, instead.

Vonnegut Jr., Kurt

47.

An honest politician is one who when he is bought will stay bought.

Cameron, W. J.

48.

Politics makes strange postmasters.

Hubbard, Kin

49.

The work of the political activist inevitably involves a certain tension between the requirement that position be taken on current issues as they arise and the desire that one's contributions will somehow survive the ravages of time.

Davis, Angela Y.

50.

A political convention is not a place where you can come away with any trace of faith in human nature.

Kempton, Murray