Archive

Quotes

You campaign in poetry. You govern in prose.

—Mario Cuomo, 1985

Envy is the basis of democracy.

—Bertrand Russell, 1930

On the loftiest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own rump.

—Michel de Montaigne, 1580

My people and I have come to an agreement that satisfies us both. They are to say what they please, and I am to do what I please.

—Frederick the Great, c. 1770

Whether for good or evil, it is sadly inevitable that all political leadership requires the artifices of theatrical illusion. In the politics of a democracy, the shortest distance between two points is often a crooked line.

—Arthur Miller, 2001

The U.S. presidency is a Tudor monarchy plus telephones.

—Anthony Burgess, 1972

Sic semper tyrannis! The South is avenged.

—John Wilkes Booth, 1865

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

—Lord Acton, 1887

There is no method by which men can be both free and equal.

—Walter Bagehot, 1863

Television has made dictatorship impossible, but democracy unbearable.

—Shimon Peres, 1995

Politics, n. A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affairs for private advantage.

—Ambrose Bierce, 1906

It is a certain sign of a wise government and proceeding, when it can hold men’s hearts by hopes, when it cannot by satisfaction.

—Francis Bacon, 1625

A real leader is somebody who can help us overcome the limitations of our own individual laziness and selfishness and weakness and fear and get us to do better, harder things than we can get ourselves to do on our own.

—David Foster Wallace, 2000