One man's opportunism is another man's statesmanship. — Milton Friedman
A politician needs the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn't happen. — Winston Churchill
[A politician is] a person skilled in the art of compromise. Usually an elected official who has compromised to get nominated, compromised to get elected, and compromised repeatedly to stay in office. — Dick Gregory
A politician is a person with whose politics you don't agree; if you agree with him he's a statesman. — David Lloyd George
A politician will do anything to keep his job - even become a patriot. — William Randolph
The mark of a true politician is that he is never at a loss for words because he is always half-expecting to be asked to make a speech. — Richard M. Nixon
An honest politician is one who when he is bought will stay bought. — W. J. Cameron
Politicians all too often think about the next election. Statesmen think about the next generation. — Linda Lingle
Divide and rule, the politician cries; unite and lead, is watchword of the wise. — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
An honest politician is one who, when he is bought, will stay bought. — Simon Cameron
In politics a capable ruler must be guided by circumstances, conjectures and conjunctions. — Catherine II
Short Great Politician Quotes
I shall be a good politician. Even if it kills me. Or if it kills anyone else, for that matter. — Mark Antony
The good lawyer is the great salesman. — Janet Reno
In order to become the master, the politician poses as the servant. — Charles De Gaulle
Man is by nature a political animal. — Aristotle
A leader is a man who can adapt principles to circumstances. — George S. Patton
The opportunist thinks of me and today. The statesman thinks of us and tomorrow. — Dwight D. Eisenhower
He knows nothing; and he thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career. — George Bernard Shaw
Anybody who has political ambition has an Achilles heel. — James Callis
The successful revolutionary is a statesman, the unsuccessful one a criminal. — Erich Fromm
Great Politician Image Quotes
Silence is a source of great strength.
A Good Politician Quotes
When politicians start talking about large groups of their fellow Americans as 'enemies,' it's time for a quiet stir of alertness. Polarizing people is a good way to win an election, and also a good way to wreck a country. — Molly Ivins
It's not enough for an official to be good. There has to be a system that forces them to be good. — Jesse Robredo
I had a good mind to discontinue permanently the supply of grain to the city, reliance on which had discouraged Italian agriculture, but refrained because some politician would be bound one day to revive the dole as a means of ingratiating himself with the people. — Augustus
Make today so awesome, yesterday gets jealous.
People expect Byzantine, Machiavellian logic from politicians. But the truth is simple. Trial lawyers learn a good rule: 'Don't decide what you don't have to decide.' That's not evasion, it's wisdom. — Mario Cuomo
I want you to take a good, hard look at me, America, because this is exactly what you’ve got coming. — Ted Cruz
When politicians offer you something for nothing, or something that sounds too good to be true, it's always worth taking a careful second look. — Malcolm Turnbull
Great minds discuss ideas.Average minds discuss events.Small minds discuss people.
Remember that the biggest thing you could do today is a small act of kindness. — Cory Booker
I can remember when a good politician had to be 75 percent ability and
25 percent actor, but I can well see the day when the reverse could be
true. — Harry S. Truman
The indignation of politicians is NOT a good measure of the gravity of any situation. — Paul Harvey
If experience teaches us anything at all, it teaches us this: that a good politician, under democracy, is quite as unthinkable as an honest burglar. — H. L. Mencken
Good Politician Quotes
Some politician some years ago said that bad officials are elected by good voters who do not vote. — Dwight D. Eisenhower
Bad politicians are sent to Washington by good people who don't vote. — William E. Simon
Everything we know about human nature and about government tells us that individuals using their own money will achieve far more good for themselves and far more for others than politicians spending money they didn't have to work to earn. — Harry Browne
Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love.
People are so docile right now. It is almost as if good government means when the politicians lie to us for our own good, for the public good, and bad government is when politicians lie for their own selfish interests. — James Bovard
All of us who are concerned for peace and triumph of reason and justice must be keenly aware how small an influence reason and honest good will exert upon events in the political field. — Albert Einstein
I don't profess to be a healer, a minister, a priest. I feel as an entertainer I can do more good for the world than I would if I were a soapbox orator or a self-made politician. — Liberace
Acknowledge all of your small victories. They will eventually add up to something great.
All the politics in the world are nothing else but a kind of analysis of the quantity of probability in casual events, and a good politician signifies no more but one who is dexterous at such calculations. — John Arbuthnot
People are not in a good mood when any politician's face appears on television. — Mark Russell
Compassion is good but politicians have turned compassion into the welfare state. — Thomas Sowell
The media, the corporations, the politicians…have all done such a good job of scaring the American public, it’s come to the point where they don’t need to give any reason at all. — Michael Moore
Bad Politician Quotes
Times are bad. Children no longer obey their parents, and everyone is writing a book. — Marcus Tullius Cicero
Ninety percent of the politicians give the other ten percent a bad reputation. — Henry A Kissinger
Politicians are like bad horsemen who are so preoccupied with staying in the saddle that they can't bother about where they're going. — Joseph A. Schumpeter
You need a little bit of insanity to do great things.
Ignorance allowed politicians to fool people and bad administrators to be re-elected. — Malala Yousafzai
When the federal government spends more each year than it collects in tax revenues, it has three choices: It can raise taxes, print money, or borrow money. While these actions may benefit politicians, all three options are bad for average Americans. — Ron Paul
An actor knows two important things - to be honest in what he is doing and to be in touch with the audience. That's not bad advice for a politician either. — Ronald Reagan
Failure is a great teacher, and, if you are open to it, every mistake has a lesson to offer.
A group of politicians deciding to dump a President because his morals are bad is like the Mafia getting together to bump off the Godfather for not going to church on Sunday. — Russell Baker
I think politicians sometimes badly underestimate the true feelings that Americans have for the land. — Mo Udall
Education had been a great gift for him [Ziauddin]. He believed that lack of education was the root of all the Pakistan's problems. Ignorance allowed politicians to fool people and bad administrators to be reelected. He believed schooling should be available for all, rich and poor, boys and girls. — Malala Yousafzai
Middle class America is acutely aware of how bad this economy is, and it is going to demand changes. I don't think politicians can afford to be complacent. — Elizabeth Warren
Great Political Quotes
There is nothing I dread so much as the division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our constitution. — John Adams
An honest public servant can't become rich in politics. He can only attain greatness and satisfaction by service. — Harry S. Truman
It is the intense spirituality of India, and not any great political structure or social organisation that it has developed, that has enabled it to resist the ravages of time and the accidents of history. — Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
All rising to great places is by a winding stair. — Buddha
All the ills of mankind, all the tragic misfortunes that fill the history books, all the political blunders, all the failures of the great leaders have arisen merely from a lack of skill at dancing. — Moliere
That these united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown; and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved. — Richard Henry Lee
To a great mind, nothing is little.
From where many of us in the U.K. sit, American politics is hopelessly polarized. All kinds of issues get bundled up into two great heaps. The rest of the world, today and across the centuries, simply doesn't see things in this horribly oversimplified way. — N. T. Wright
We find two great gangs of political speculators, who alternately take possession of the state power and exploit it by the most corrupt ends -- the nation is powerless against these two great cartels of politicians who are ostensibly its servants, but in reality dominate and plunder it. — Friedrich Engels
A great civilization is not conquered from without, until it has destroyed itself from within. The essential causes of Rome's decline lay in her people, her morals, her class struggle, her failing trade, her bureaucratic despotism, her stifling taxes, her consuming wars. — Will Durant
The great issues facing us today are not Republican issues or Democratic issues. The political parties can debate the means, but both parties must embrace the end objective, which is to make America great again. — Lee Iacocca
A real leader uses every issue, no matter how serious and sensitive, to ensure that at the end of the debate we should emerge stronger and more united than ever before. — Nelson Mandela
Average people have great ideas. Legends have great execution.
I started in London, as a kid. My mother knew I had sort of an inbred talent. She was an actress, so I inherited it from her. But I think I got a lot of it from my grandfather, who was a great politician. — Angela Lansbury
The new nation called Nigeria should be an estate of our great-grandfather, Uthman Dan Fodio. We must ruthlessly prevent a change of power. We use the minorities of the North as willing tools and the South as a conquered territory and never allow them to rule over us, and never allow them to have control over their future. — Ahmadu Bello
Every politician, clergyman, educator, or physician, in short, anyone dealing with human individuals, is bound to make grave mistakes if he ignores these two great truths of population zoology: (1) no two individuals are alike, and (2) both environment and genetic endowment make a contribution to nearly every trait. — Ernst Mayr
Don't fear the failure... in great attempts it is glorious even to fail.
The woman, in a battle of fists or guns, may not be as great a power as a man; but a woman behind a vote is every bit as useful as a man. — Irene Parlby
I will no longer allow my obligation as a veteran to remember those who died in the great wars to be co-opted by current or former politicians to justify our folly in Iraq, our morally dubious war on terror and our elimination of one's right to privacy. — Harry Leslie Smith
Be proud to be a decent American rather than a wanker whipping up fear. — Michael D. Higgins
Even a wizard would have a great deal of difficulty repealing the economic law that higher minimum wages reduce employment. Since politicians are not wizards, they should not try. — Gary Becker
Lofty talk about 'social justice' or 'fairness' boils down to greatly expanded powers for politicians, since those pretty words have no concrete definition. They are a blank check for creating disparities in power that dwarf disparities in income - and are far more dangerous. — Thomas Sowell
May future generations look back on our work
and say that these were men and women who,
in a moment of great crisis,
stood up to their politicians,
the opinion-makers, and the establishment,
and saved their country. — Ron Paul
I have great respect for press freedoms. At the same time, however, a politician also has the freedom to decide whether he or she will accept an invitation to appear on a show or not. — Angela Merkel
You can't fool all of the people all of the time. But it isn't necessary. — Will Rogers
Obama's the most thoughtful-sounding president I can remember. He seems to be saying what he wants to say, and that is a great relief. He always sounds like he's thinking about what he's saying while he's saying it, and that's a rare thing in politicians. — Roy Blount, Jr.
Our great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be honest than a clever man, and our politicians take advantage of this prejudice by pretending to be even more stupid than nature has made them. — Bertrand Russell
Don't let the politicians chip away at the New Deal and the Great Society programs like Social Security and Medicare, that puts a floor beyond which the elderly, the sick, the powerless do not starve or lack for medicine or shelter. — Helen Thomas
No one since the Garden of Eden - which the serpent forsook in order to run for higher office - has imputed to politicians great purity of motive. — William F. Buckley, Jr.
Coffee which makes the politician wise, and see through all things with his half-shut eyes. — Alexander Pope
The ability to change one's views without losing one's seat is the mark of a great politician. — Mo Udall
Almost all politicians are able to have a great one-on-one meeting. But Im not interested in the candidate who can have a great meeting. Im interested in the person who can make the right decisions. — Kenneth C. Griffin
If all politicians fished instead of spoke publicly, we would be at peace with the world. — Will Rogers
That politician who curries favor with the citizens and indulges them and fawns upon them and has a presentiment of their wishes, and is skillful in gratifying them, he is esteemed a great statesman. — Plato
America became a great nation early on not because it was flooded with politicians, but because it was flooded with people who understood the value of personal responsibility, hard work, creativity, innovation, and that's what will get us on the right track now, as well. — Benjamin Carson
Pierre Trudeau was too much of a professional politician to be described as a good man, nor, it can be argued despite much pubilicity to the contrary, was he a particularly clever or even wise one. But he was a great man, perhaps the gratest Canada has produced in this century. — Peter Brimelow
I think that when you look at the great politicians, the two greatest in my view were George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, they certainly had character traits. You also know Abraham Lincoln overcame severe depression problems that he had when he was younger, which gave him the strength and the character later on. — John McCain
The future lies with those wise political leaders who realize that the great public is interested more in government than in politics. — Franklin D. Roosevelt
Great and glorious events which dazzle the beholder are represented by politicians as the outcome of grand designs whereas they are usually products of temperaments and passions. — Francois de la Rochefoucauld
I learned in grade-school that after WWII European politicians considered sending Jews to Madagascar instead of Palestine. At the time I thought: Madagascar would've been so great. — Jill Soloway
A great politician has great charisma. — Catherine Zeta-Jones
It looks like the financial giants of the world have bungled as much as the diplomats and politicians. This would be a great time in the world for some man to come along that knew something. — Will Rogers
The politician being interviewed clearly takes a great deal of trouble to imagine an ending to his sentence: and if he stopped short? His entire policy would be jeopardized! — Roland Barthes
The great common people of this country are slaves, and monopoly is the master. . . . The politicians said we suffered from overproduction. Overproduction, when 10,000 little children, so statistics tell us, starve to death every year in the United States. . . . We will stand by our homes and stay by our fireside by force if necessary, and we will not pay our debts to the loan-shark companies until the government pays its debts to us. — Mary Elizabeth Lease
Actors who have tried to play Churchill and MacArthur have failed abysmally because each of those men was a great actor playing himself. — William Manchester
Self-reliance can turn a salesman into a merchant; a politician into a statesman; an attorney into a jurist; an unknown youth into a great leader. All are to be tomorrow's big leaders - those who in solitude sit above the clang and dust of time, with the world's secret trembling on their lips. — Newell Dwight Hillis
In really hard times the rules of the game are altered. The inchoate mass begins to stir. It becomes potent, and when it strikes, it strikes with incredible emphasis. Those are the rare occasions when a national will emerges from the scattered, specialized, or indifferent blocs of voters who ordinarily elect the politicians. Those are for good or evil the great occasions in a nation's history. — Walter Lippmann
Sometimes I wonder whether Washington's liberal politicians truly understand the greatness that is America. — Mitt Romney
If you're looking for a slick politician or a guy with great teleprompter skills, we already have that. He's destroying our economy. I'm a doer, not a talker. — Rick Perry
I think politicians do great things in the world, but I don't think they're the only ones who can. I don't like all the rhetoric and the finger pointing. — Lauren Bush
Every person seems to acknowledge his greatness. He blends together the profound politician with the scholar. — William Pierce
My coach was a great politician, so he did most of the work. He was good. — Dorothy Hamill
Of course great politicians are always liable to be wrong about something, and the more people tell them they are wrong, the more stubbornly they defend their error. — Ferdinand Mount
I think politicians get hamstrung by the nature of politics when the private sector can really do great things. — Henry Rollins
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