My favorite quotes

[ChadGore]

The difference between a politician and a statesman is: a politician thinks of the next election and the statesman thinks of the next generation. James Freeman Clarke

[ChadGore]

Re: Curiosity killed the cat... ...Women and minorities hardest hit.

[Phsstpok]

''There are lies, there are damned lies, ... and then there are statistics.'' -- Benjamin Disraeli

I've been paraphrasing and extending Disraeli for the modern age:

There are lies, damned lies, statistics and presentation graphics, in descending order of credibility.

[april15Bendovr]

That is Ironic but amusingly true about how and when liberals will decide upon to act.

[SAMWolf]

Welcome to Free Republic.

"What you have inherited from your fathers,
earn over again for yourselves or it will not be yours."
Goethe

We inherited freedom. We seem unaware that freedom has to be remade and re-earned in each generation of man.

Poor is the nation that has no heroes.
Shameful is the one that, having heroes - Forgets them!
from a monument on the Davis Bridge Battlefield, Bolivar, TN

Those Who Have Long Enjoyed Such Privileges As We Enjoy,
Forget In Time that Men Have Died To Win Them.
Franklin D. Roosevelt

Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.
Ronald Reagan

A government big enough to give you everything you want
is a government big enough to take from you everything you have.
Gerald Ford, 1974

A government that is big enough to give you all you want is big enough to take it all away
Barry Goldwater

Do not fear the enemy, for your enemy can only take your life. It is far better that you fear the media, for they will steal your HONOR. That awful power, the public opinion of a nation, is created in America by a horde of ignorant, self-complacent simpletons who failed at ditching and shoemaking and fetched up in journalism on their way to the poorhouse.
Mark Twain

"Nuts!"
General Anthony McAuliffe, United States Army

[SAJ]

Sooooo true! (g!)

[SAJ]

Batsy -- Here ya go.

-------

Nancy Witcher Langhorne, Lady Astor, MP, at a dinner party in 1938:

''Oh, be silent Winston! You're drunk.''

Winston Churchill, MP:

''I am drunk. And you, madam, are ugly. However, tomorrow morning I shall be sober.''

Note: Lady Astor was the first woman to introduce a bill in Parliament, and is often considered to be the epitome of haughtiness. She and Churchill, although both Tories, had any number of famous rows.

[dpa5923]

Results are more important than attempts. "I tried" is never a substitute for "I did." - me

Just one of many.

[leprechaun9]

I read the following in a book of quotes, attributed to Thomas Jefferson:

A man who reads nothing at all is better educated than a man who reads nothing but newspapers!

[april15Bendovr]

What was I thinking. Thanks for the correction. A gross error on my part although I am sure Cronkite would of rather that it be a ommission.

[B4Ranch]

I don't approve of political jokes. I've seen too many of them get elected.


You can evade reality, but you cannot evade the consequences of evading reality - Ayn Rand)

As scarce as truth is, the supply invariably exceeds the demand.

If everything appears to be going well, you obviously don't know what the hell is going on.


Civil servants are neither civil nor servile.

These days, an education is essential for career success.
Unless, of course, you run for Congress.

Whenever a man casts a longing eye at public office, a rottenness appears in his conduct.

It is better to resign from office than it is to die in office; that way, you get to hear some of the eulogies.

Crime is merely politics without the excuses.

Politicians deal with the public on the basis of the mushroom policy:
Keep them in the dark and feed them manure.

Give me an example of pro and con.
Progress and Congress.


Honesty in politics is much like oxygen.
The higher up you go, the scarcer it becomes.

"A hobo is a migratory worker. A tramp is a migratory non-worker. A bum is a stationary non-worker."
What is your Congressman?

In third-world politics, the people with the guns call the shots. So keep yours handy!

Political cunning should never be mistaken for intelligence.

Those who like sausage or political policy should not watch either being made.


The British parliament is called the "Mother of Legislatures".
A somewhat similar term is often applied to Congress.

Politicians are much like ships: noisiest when lost in a fog.

Practical politics consists of ignoring the facts. Come to think of it, practical anything consists of that.

Activity is the politician's substitute for achievement.

Truth is very precious, this why salesmen and politicians say they use it very sparingly.

A politician's most important ability is to foretell what will happen tomorrow and next month and next year -
and to explain afterwards why it didn't happen.

No man's life, liberty, or property are safe whilst the legislature is in session.

Ambition is the curse of the political class.

Every institution tends to perish through an excess of its own policy.

Support Capitol Punishment, Flog a Politician Today

During Britain's "brain drain," not a single politician left the country.

It is difficult to be politically conscious and upwardly mobile at the same time.

A politician should do two terms - one in office and one in jail

Politicians and diapers have one thing in common.
They should both be changed regularly, and for the same reason.

Invest in America Buy a Congressman!

[Deb8]

"Obesity is rare among large breeds but the Labrador Retriever has an intense love of food and a unique ability to convince its owner that it is starving."
from Labrador Retrievers: The Dog that Does it all

[Nea Wood]

There are many good ones attributed to Will Rogers:

The taxpayers are sending congressmen on expensive trips abroad. It might be worth it except they keep coming back!

Why don't they pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting anybody from learning anything? If it works as well as prohibition did, in five years Americans would be the smartest race of people on Earth.

Never miss a good chance to shut up.

A fool and his money are soon elected.

Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie' until you can find a rock.

I don't make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts.

Our constitution protects aliens, drunks and U.S. Senators.

Live in such a way that you would not be ashamed to sell your parrot to the town gossip.

[nolu chan]

Both quotes are attributed to Lady Astor. Her husband went to the House of Lords in 1919, and she won the seat he vacated in the House of Commons which she held until 1945. She was born American in 1879, moved to England in 1903. Here are a few similar comebacks.

Lady Astor was giving a costume ball and Winston Churchill asked her what disguise she would recommend for him. She said, "Why don't you come sober, Mr. Prime Minister?"

When the noted playwright George Bernard Shaw sent him two tickets to the opening night of his new play with a note that read: "Bring a friend, if you have one," Churchill promptly wired back: "I'll be there for the second performance, if there is one."

Once at a social gathering, Gladstone said to Disraeli, "I predict, Sir, that you will die either by hanging or of some vile disease". Disraeli replied, "That all depends, sir, upon whether I embrace your principles or your mistress."

It is said that Dorothy Parker and Clare Booth Luce arrived at a door simultaneously. Clare motions Parker ahead and says:
"Age before beauty"
Parker sweeps through the door without a pause and says over her shoulder:
"And pearls before swine."

[537 Votes]

The man with a toothache thinks everyone happy whose teeth are sound. The poverty-stricken man makes the same mistake about the rich man. - George Bernard Shaw

All else being equal, I would think that rich people with sound teeth who are nonetheless miserable are the ones making the mistake.

[ovrtaxt]

Hehe! Good screen name.

"A room without books is like a body without a soul."
- Marcus Tullius Cicero
"If winning isn't everything, why do they keep score?"
- Vince Lombardi
"When we remember we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained."
- Mark Twain
"Unquestionably, there is progress. The average American now pays out twice as much in taxes as he formerly got in wages."
- H. L. Mencken
"Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored."
- Aldous Huxley
"Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut."
- Ernest Hemingway
"Whenever you find that you are on the side of the majority, it is time to reform."
- Mark Twain
"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it."
- Aristotle
"Suppose you were an idiot and suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself."
-Mark Twain
"The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not."
-Thomas Jefferson
"Any law which violates the indefeasible rights of man is essentially unjust and tyrannical; it is not a law at all."
-Maximilien Robespierre
"The government’s only proper job is to protect individual rights against violence by force or fraud…to protect men from foreign invaders…to settle disputes among men according to objective laws….The greatness of the Founding Fathers was how well they understood this issue and how close some of them came to understanding it perfectly."
-Ayn Rand
"I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore and diverting myself now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the Great Ocean of Truth lay all undiscovered before me." - Sir Isaac Newton

People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.
Soren Kierkegaard (1813 - 1855)

The love of liberty is the love of others; the love of power is the love of ourselves.
William Hazlitt (1778 - 1830)

Nobody can give you freedom. Nobody can give you equality or justice or anything. If you're a man, you take it.
Malcolm X (1925 - 1965)

If you want to be free, there is but one way; it is to guarantee an equally full measure of liberty to all your neighbors. There is no other.
Carl Schurz (1829 - 1906)

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.
Benjamin Franklin (1706 - 1790)

Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom.
Albert Einstein (1879 - 1955),

Politics is supposed to be the second oldest profession. I have come to realize that it bears a very close resemblance to the first.
Ronald Reagan (1911 - )

[MadelineZapeezda]

Here's an old thread about Favorite Patriotic Quotes" , an oldie but goodie.

[Mikey]

Welcome

to

FreeRepublic

[Mikey]

Yeah and some people say time travel isn't possible.

[glasseye]

"Every normal man must at times feel the urge to spit on his hands, raise the black flag, and begin slitting throats."...HL Menkin