Motivational Quotes

Politics

The ordinary politician has a very low estimate of human nature. In his daily life he comes into contact chiefly with persons who want to get something or to avoid something. Beyond this circle of seekers after privileges, individuals and organized minorities, he is aware of a large unorganized, indifferent mass of citizens who ask nothing in particular and rarely complain. The politician comes after a while to think that the art of politics is to satisfy the seekers after favors and to mollify the inchoate mass with noble sentiments and patriotic phrases.

- Lippmann, Walter

Best Quotes about Politics

My constituency is the desperate, the damned, the disinherited, the disrespected and the despised.

Jackson, Jesse

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.

You have to have been a Republican to know how good it is to be a Democrat.

Onassis, Jacqueline Kennedy

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

Gaulle, Charles De

In politics we presume that everyone who knows how to get votes knows how to administer a city or a state. When we are ill... we do not ask for the handsomest physician, or the most eloquent one.

Plato

All political parties die at last of swallowing their own lies.

Arbuthnot, John

A candidate could easily commit political suicide if he were to come up with an unconventional thought during a presidential tour.

White, Elwyn Brooks

Politics is not worrying this country one-tenth as much as where to find a parking space.

Rogers, Will

Nothing can so alienate a voter from the political system as backing a winning candidate.

Mark B. Cohen

10.

A radical is a man with both feet firmly planted in the air.

Roosevelt, Franklin D.

11.

The more you read and observe about this Politics thing, you got to admit that each party is worse than the other. The one that's out always looks the best.

Will Rogers

12.

The Tories in England had long imagined that they were enthusiastic about the monarchy, the church and beauties of the old English Constitution, until the day of danger wrung from them the confession that they are enthusiastic only about rent.

Marx, Karl

13.

Political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible.

Orwell, George

14.

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

15.

Once you run for office, you're in it -- sort of like going into the military. You'd better be damned sure it is what you want to do and that the rest of your life is set up to accommodate that. It takes a certain toll on your personality and on your family life. I've seen it personally.

Kennedy Jr., John F.

16.

In politics... never retreat, never retract... never admit a mistake.

Bonaparte, Napoleon

17.

Finality is not the language of politics.

Disraeli, Benjamin

18.

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

19.

Politics is the enemy of the imagination.

Mcewan, Ian

20.

Political success is the ability, when the inevitable occurs, to get credit for it.

Peter, Laurence J.

21.

There is one rule for politicians all over the world: Don't say in Power what you say in opposition; if you do, you only have to carry out what the other fellows have found impossible.

Galsworthy, John

22.

Rome had Senators too, and that is why it declined.

Dane, Frank

23.

Before we get too depressed about the state of our politics, let's remember our history. The great debates of the past, all stirred great passions. They all made somebody angry, and at least once led to a terrible war. What is amazing, is that despite all the conflict, our experiment in democracy has worked better than any form of government on earth.

President Barack Obama

24.

Heads of state are notoriously ill prepared for their mature careers; think of Adolf Hitler (landscape painter), Ho Chi Minh (seaman), and our own Ronald Reagan.

Ehrenreich, Barbara

25.

The politician is like an acrobat : he keeps his balance By saying the opposite of what he does.

Barres

26.

I find myself... hoping a total end of all the unhappy divisions of mankind by party-spirit, which at best is but the madness of many for the gain of a few.

Pope, Alexander

27.

Politics is far more complicated than physics.

Einstein, Albert

28.

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.

29.

The only way you can do that [Balance The Budget, Decrease Taxes, and Increase Military Spending] is with mirrors, and that's what it would take.

Anderson, John B.

30.

You know, what I very well know, that I bought you. And I know, what perhaps you think I don't know, you are now selling yourselves to somebody else; and I know, what you do not know, that I am buying another borough. May God's curse light upon you all: may your houses be as open and common to all Excise Officers as your wives and daughters were to me, when I stood for your scoundrel corporation.

Henley, Anthony

31.

The success of a party means little more than that the Nation is using the party for a large and definite purpose. It seeks to use and interpret a change in its own plans and point of view.

Wilson, Woodrow T.

32.

Politics should share one purpose with religion: the steady emancipation of the individual through the education of his passions.

Will, George F.

33.

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

Pell, Claiborne

34.

In politics the choice is constantly between two evils.

Morley, John

35.

Those who corrupt the public mind are just as evil as those who steal from the public purse.

Stevenson, Adlai E.

36.

There are times in politics when you must be on the right side and lose.

Galbraith, John Kenneth

37.

The Empress is legitimate, my cousin is Republican, Morny is Orleanist, I am a socialist; the only Bonapartist is Persigny, and he is mad.

Napoleon III

38.

Nothing is so foolish, they say, as for a man to stand for office and woo the crowd to win its vote, buy its support with presents, court the applause of all those fools and feel self-satisfied when they cry their approval, and then in his hour of triumph to be carried round like an effigy for the public to stare at, and end up cast in bronze to stand in the market place.

Erasmus, Desiderius

39.

Idealism is the noble toga that political gentlemen drape over their will to power.

Huxley, Aldous

40.

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

Kempton, Murray

41.

In Mexico an air conditioner is called a politician because it makes a lot of noise but doesn't work very well.

Deighton, Len

42.

Republicans believe every day is the Fourth of July, but the democrats believe every day is April 15.

Reagan, Ronald

43.

We mean by politics the people's business -- the most important business there is.

Stevenson, Adlai E.

44.

Political organizations have slowly substituted themselves for the Churches as the places for believing practices. Politics has once again become religious.

Certeau, Michel De

45.

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

Fuller, R. Buckminster

46.

You slam a politician, you make out he's the devil, with horns and hoofs. But his wife loves him, and so did all his mistresses.

Johnson, Pamela Hansford

47.

Never answer a question from a farmer.

Humphrey, Hubert H.

48.

We are not just here to manage capitalism but to change society and to define its finer values.

Benn, Tony

49.

Politicians have the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. And to have the ability afterward to explain why it didn't happen.

Churchill, Winston

50.

Politics is a profession where the paths of glory lead but to the gravy.

Franklin, Billy Boy