William Kristol Quotes

If we free the people of Iraq, we will be respected in the Arab world.

.. and I think we will be respected around the world.

Whenever I hear anything described as a heartless assault on our children, I tend to think it’s a good idea.

Having defeated and then occupied Iraq, democratizing the country should not be too tall an order for the world's sole superpower.

American power should be used not just in the defense of American interests but for the promotion of American principles.

If terror groups are to be defeated, it is national governments that will have to do so. In nations like India, governments will have to call on the patriotism of citizens to fight the terrorists. In a nation like Pakistan, the government will have to be persuaded to deal with those in their midst who are complicit.

I've always rebelled a little when people say, 'My Jewish values lead me to really care about the poor.' I know some Christians who care about the poor, too.

Republicans can also point to an alternate path.

They can draw upon genuine experts to explain what should be done.

I personally - if I were designing the tax code - would have a tax code in which Mitt Romney paid more than 13 percent, given what I know about the kind of investments he made money from.

These soldiers deserve a better defense secretary than the one we have.

Patriotism is an indispensable weapon in the defense of civilization against barbarism.

We can remove Saddam because that could start a chain reaction in the Arab world that would be very healthy.

The average GOP presidential vote in these last five elections was 44.

5 percent. In the last three, it was 48.1 percent. Give Romney an extra point for voter disillusionment with Obama, and a half-point for being better financed than his predecessors. It still strikes me as a path to narrow defeat.

All defense secretaries in wartime have, needless to say, made misjudgments.

Lest conservatives be too proud, it's worth recalling that conservatism's rise was decisively enabled by liberalism's weakness.

Some journalists just get too wrapped up in daily news cycles and tempests in a teapot that are not going to make any difference. As someone who is older and has been through a few election cycles, maybe this is just being an old fogey, but I think I know what's going to really matter and what's not.

I mean, obviously, one of the strongest arguments against evolution and selection of the fittest and progress, which is part of evolution, is the current field of the presidential candidates. We started off with Washington and Adams and Jefferson and then we had Lincoln, and now we moved ahead and look where we are now.

In any case, decisions on troop levels in the American system of government are not made by any general or set of generals but by the civilian leadership of the war effort.

The liberal media were never that powerful, and the whole thing was often used as an excuse by conservatives for conservative failures.

Shouldn't Democrats insist that Sen. Durbin step down as their whip, the number two man in their leadership?

Many of Bush's defenders have praised him for keeping the country safe since Sept. 11, 2001. He deserves that praise, and I'm perfectly happy to defend most of his surveillance, interrogation and counterterrorism policies against his critics.

Political parties are complicated coalitions and aren't excessively theoretical.

I like [ Rick] Santorum personally and respect him, but you wouldn't say that he was really that strong of an opponent. At the end of the day it wasn't like [Ronald] Reagan running against [George] Bush, or [George W.] Bush against [John] McCain, even. It's sort of surprising that Romney had as much trouble as he did, and I think it shows a weakness in appeal to those voters.

I don't think [Mitt] Romney can sit there and wait to win because perhaps people are disappointed with President [Barack] Obama.

While a defeat for Obamacare in the Court would be nice, the defeat of President Obama at the polls on November 6 is crucial. If electoral victory is achieved, Obamacare can and will be repealed - and more judges of a constitutionalist persuasion will be appointed by the next president.

I think it's fine that there are five million people who are watching [politics on TV], and obviously I'm happy they are since they're on the air, and there are a couple hundred thousand people reading The Weekly Standard online, and that's great too, but most Americans aren't engaged that intensely, and are much less partisan.

The repealing and replacing of Obamacare is very complicated.

It is what a White House and congressional leadership, serious White House and serious congressional leadership, should meet on and work on and figure out a strategy of, and it may work and it may not. Obviously not every administration gets things through, even when they have much larger majorities in congress and a much larger popular vote than Donald Trump had.

I am on the whole a defender of the current, despite being a conservative.

I mean, I think things are better than when I was younger.

I don't think you want political parties that are entirely driven by some extremely doctrinal ideology.

Barack Obama is not going to beat Hillary Clinton in a single Democratic primary. I’ll predict that right now.

You all would be really shocked, if you were dropped back down into when I went to college, by the narrowness of the opinions you could get just by reading newspapers and magazines and watching TV.

Conservatives shouldn't count on the Supreme Court to do our work for us on Obamacare. The Court may rule as it should, and strike down the mandate. But it may not. And even if it does, the future of health care in America - and for that matter, the future of limited government - depends ultimately on the verdict of the American people.

[Donald Trump] will try to renegotiate the trade deals a little bit.

I think reading intelligent expressions of different points of view is a good thing, and there is a way in which being in academia in a classroom at the University probably gives you, can give you an academic view of things, and reading actual real time debates about what should we do in Syria or the Buffett rule, budget issues...gives you a kind of sense that's hard to get in a classroom.

I think the whole dynamic is different.

Whereas in [Barack] Obama's case, even though there was no incumbent, he was able to run against eight years of Bush-Cheney and a Republican Congress, and everyone was tired of everything. He was able to benefit from that.

The ObamaCare premiums, the numbers started moving away from Hillary Clinton he moment there was a problem with.

He has a competent person, I think who will be confirmed as HHS secretary, Congressman Tom Price.

Iraq's always been very secular.

Fox gets two million viewers a night, and MSNBC gets one.

It's four million people, five million people, and 130 million people are going to vote. There are an awful lot of voters, and an awful lot of politically engaged, intelligent people who are not hanging on whatever happens on Bill O'Reilly or Rachel Maddow.

If you look at the polls - the conservatives are fine.I think there will be a fair amount of enthusiasm, or at least motivation. They very much want to remove President [Barack] Obama.

There will be trying times during Obama's presidency, and liberty will need staunch defenders. Can Obama reshape liberalism to be, as it was under F.D.R., a fighting faith, unapologetically patriotic and strong in the defense of liberty? That would be a service to our country.

Conservatism as an "ism" is always going to be somewhat in tension with a political party.

If President [Barack] Obama - President [Donald] Trump shows up with a, you know, cleaver and just says, I can get rid of all these regulations, I can get rid of ObamaCare, no problem at all, then that would be a mistake.

Obviously I think politics is interesting and important and educational.

My sense from talking to college students is that you have a healthier sense of the diversity of opinions or arguments or analysis about issues. In our day it was just sort of, "Well gee, this is what the news says so that's the way it is." It didn't really get challenged that much.

Actually, not because of anyone's intention but just because of some sociological and some other things that have happened over 25, 30 years, the parties have sorted themselves out much more ideologically, which has some benefits and some costs.

For all the talk about the bitterness and the partisanship in American politics, is it really that bitter and partisan? Think of American history. Think of Joseph McCarthy. Think of the New Left. Think of [George] McGovern. Think of [Ronald] Reagan. Think of George Wallace. We've had an awful lot of real extremism on both wings.

He should release the tax returns tomorrow. It's crazy. You've got to release six, eight, ten years back tax returns. Take the hit for a day or two. He has to give a big speech in defense of capitalism, and that will elevate, I think, this race above this tactical back and forth, which I do think he's on the margin of losing.

I think there was a moment in the middle part of the century into the 60s, 70s when at least elite journalism claimed to be non-partisan. You can go back and look at it and wonder about how non-partisan it was.

If the American people really come to a settled belief that Bush lied us into war, his presidency will be over.