Congress, the press, and the bureaucracy too often focus on how much money or effort is spent, rather than whether the money or effort actually achieves the announced goal.

Politics is personal; personal is political.

What politicians want and what creative writers want will always be profoundly different, because I’m afraid all politicians, of whatever hue, want propaganda, and writers want the truth, and they’re not compatible.

I’m not a political person. I’m a human rights person.

Insect politics, indifferent universe. Bang your head against the wall, but apathy is worse.

I’m highly political. I spend an awful lot of time in the U.S. trying to influence decision-makers. But I don’t feel in tune with British politics.

In Pakistan politics is hereditary.

There can only be democracy when money is not allowed to be spent in Politics.

I will certainly not join politics. I would like to be remembered as a clean businessman who has not partaken in any twists and turns beneath the surface, and one who has been reasonably successful.

I went into politics on an emotional level and soon realised that emotion has nothing to do with politics.

I don’t have business with any politicians.

In war, you can only be killed once, but in politics, many times.

I love peace and quiet, I hate politics and turmoil. We women are not made for governing, and if we are good women, we must dislike these masculine occupations.

There is no ‘power’ without a bit of ‘ow.

Everything is politics. And everyone has an ideology. Without one, we are animals.

As human beings you cannot be apolitical, the way we frame a character is telling our politics.

One can be a great poet and be politically stupid.

As if political liberty made wage slavery any the more tolerable!

The end of all political movement is to attain that highest and noblest common good which makes life worth living.

One of the necessary accompaniments of capitalism in a democracy is political corruption.

Politicians are so detested. And the main cause is not policy; it’s the fact that there is no trust.

We need to remember that politics is all about people, not programs. We shouldn’t want to take the humanness out of the political arena.

I would love to be associated with some sports organization. I was a journalism major. That’s kind of intriguing, to do something in the political-commentary arena.

For longer than I’ve been involved in the political process, the Republican establishment has claimed to want to provide an alternative for the black community, yet party elite refuse to show up for the game.

Reparations, I believe, are talked about for political reasons, trying to cater for the purpose of getting votes. If Congress was serious about reparations – in ’93 and ’94 the Democrats controlled the House, the Senate and the White House, and not one single Republican vote was needed for reparations.

Redistricting is a deeply political process, with incumbents actively seeking to minimize the risk to themselves (via bipartisan gerrymanders) or to gain additional seats for their party (via partisan gerrymanders)

In addition to the decline in competition, American politics today is characterized by a growing ideological polarization between the two major political parties.

Incumbents are safe, but party majorities are not. This fosters symbolic votes, message politics and little serious legislating in Congress

Further-more, partisan attachments powerfully shape political perceptions, beliefs and values, and incumbents enjoy advantages well beyond the way in which their districts are configured.

The country has sorted itself ideologically into the two political parties, and those partisan attachments have hardened in recent years. It will take an extraordinary event and act of leadership to break this partisan divide. I thought 9/11 might provide such an opportunity, but it was not seized

First, a man of sense would have known that a single experiment is not sufficient to establish a general rule even in sciences much less complicated than the science of government; that, since the beginning of the world, no two political experiments were ever made of which all the conditions were exactly alike; and that the only way to learn civil prudence from history is to examine and compare an immense number of cases.

Every political sect has its esoteric and its exoteric school – its abstract doctrines for the initiated; its visible symbols, its imposing forms, its mythological fables, for the vulgar.

All men are naturally included to obscure the morally ambiguous element in their political cause by investing it with religious sanctity.

The security intended to the general liberty consists in the frequent election and in the rotation of the members of Congress.

The nation which reposes on the pillow of political confidence, will sooner or later end its political existence in a deadly lethargy.

What influence, in fact, have ecclesiastical establishments had on society? In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins of the civil authority; on many instances they have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny; in no instance have they been the guardians of the liberties of the people. Rulers who wish to subvert the public liberty may have found an established clergy convenient auxiliaries. A just government, instituted to secure and perpetuate it, needs them not.

Despotism can only exist in darkness, and there are too many lights now in the political firmament, to permit it to remain anywhere, as it has heretofore done, almost everywhere.

We have staked the whole future of our new nation, not upon the power of government; far from it. We have staked the future of all our political constitutions upon the capacity of each of ourselves to govern ourselves according to the moral principles of the Ten Commandments.

Where an excess of power prevails, property of no sort is duly respected. No man is safe in his opinions, his person, his faculties, or his possessions.

Liberty is to faction, what air is to fire, an aliment, without which it instantly expires. But it could not be a less folly to abolish liberty, which is essential to political life, because it nourish faction, than it would be to wish the annihilation of air, which is essential to animal life, because it imparts to fire its destructive agency.

Over the years the political establishment has frowned if a mainstream politician mentions marriage.

The swift changes in our industrial system are causing equally swift changes in our religious, political, and social structures. An unseen and fearful revolution is taking place in the fibre and structure of society. One can only dimly feel these things. But they are in the air, now, to-day. One can feel the loom of them – things vast, vague, and terrible.

Well football teams are perhaps easier to control than political parties, I’m sure the Prime Minister would agree with me, but yeah I think every team needs discipline and a sense of self-belief and that’s important, that’s what leadership’s all about.

I think almost every political leader is always told that the next speech they make is the most crucial one.

Over the years the political establishment has frowned if a mainstream politician mentions marriage.

Obviously, the duty of artists is there, but it’s more an indictment of the political system that someone like Zinn views artists as the seers, idealizing them as the people responsible for inspiring change

I think maybe since there isn’t a great deal of access to the mainstream media and people don’t understand the language of mainstream media, if you put music out there with lyrics that are loosely political, people absorb some of it and spit it back out.

My argument would be that I don’t think there is much that’s genuinely political art that is good art

If there are political programs on TV, yet it takes an artist to actually energize political debate, that tells you something really quite frightening about the level of the political debate happening on mainstream channels – right-wing-biased mothers

Music is more difficult – try naming a political band. The Dead Kennedys. The Dead Kennedys are political, but they are more funny than they are political

Music is more difficult – try naming a political band. The Dead Kennedys. The Dead Kennedys are political, but they are more funny than they are political

I don’t see it in terms of changing things, but rather using language and music as weapons for fighting a mainstream media which is predominately right wing, and loyal to the political framework and its corporate interests

“I sought in political reporting what Galsworthy in another context had called “the significant trifle” – the bit of dialogue, the overlooked fact, the buried observation which illuminated the realities of the situation.”

It is difficult to make political art work

First they gerrymander us into one-party fiefs. Then they tell us they only care about the swing districts. Then they complain about voter apathy.

Socialism, when the last word is said, is merely a new economic and political system whereby more men can get food to eat.

I believe that artistic activities change people. You do effect change. I see architecture as a political, social and cultural act – that is its primary role

It’s too simplistic to advance the notion of the autonomy of art as a reason for turning away from the public. You can have autonomy and simultaneously have connections with the social and political world

Architecture is a negotiated art, and it’s highly political, and if you want to make buildings, there is diplomacy required.

In Mexico, audiences want to see a big discussion around a film – what we expect from Hollywood films worldwide is more of an entertaining show. ‘Y Tu Mama Tambien’ was a road movie and comedy, but it had a very strong political connotation that sparked a discussion in Mexico that is still going on.

I think we’re all political, in a way. What has happened recently in my case is that, fortunately, I’ve been able to get more in touch with the things I can change and do.

First of all, everyone must acknowledge and feel that child slavery still exists in the world, in its ugliest face and form. And this is an evil, which is crime against humanity, which is intolerable, which is unacceptable and which must go. That sense of recognition must be developed first of all. And secondly there is a need of higher amounts of political will. There is a need of higher amount of corporate engagement, and the engagement of the public towards it. So, everybody has a responsibility to save and protect the children on this planet.

Yep. It’s all political, so you have to stay quiet to be able to not step on anyone’s toes.

The internet is changing all forms of communication, and this definitely includes political communication

I don’t consider my homosexuality a political thing. I consider it a sexual and spiritual thing. I only started going to political rallies to meet women.

Liberals seem to assume that, if you don’t believe in their particular political solutions, then you don’t really care about the people that they claim to want to help

Envy is always referred to by its political alias, ’social justice

In politics, the truth is strictly optional and that also seems to be true in parts of the media.

What the political left, even in democratic countries, share is the notion that knowledgeable and virtuous people like themselves have both a right and a duty to use the power of government to impose their superior knowledge and virtue on others

The most fundamental fact about the ideas of the political left is that they do not work. Therefore we should not be surprised to find the left concentrated in institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive

In this era of political correctness, some people seem unaware that being squeamish about words can mean being blind to realities

ANYONE who studies the history of ideas should notice how much more often people on the political left, more so than others, denigrate and demonize those who disagree with them – instead of answering their arguments

I don’t feel political most of the time. Sometimes I’m placed in positions because no one else will go there.

Those words, temperate and moderate, are words either of political cowardice, or of cunning, or seduction. A thing, moderately good is not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper, is always a virtue; but moderation in principle, is a species of vice.

Economics is a political argument. It is not – and can never be – a science; there are no objective truths in economics that can be established independently of political, and frequently moral, judgements. Therefore, when faced with an economic argument, you must ask the age-old question ‘Cui bono?’ (Who benefits?), first made famous by the Roman statesman and orator Marcus Tullius Cicero.

It has been the political career of this man to begin with hypocrisy, proceed with arrogance, and finish with contempt

The end of all political associations is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man; and these rights are liberty, property, security, and resistance of oppression

I was thirty-five and I’d thought I was playing political poker and it turned out I’d been playing in some other game I didn’t even know about.

If you want to study the social and political history of modern nations, study hell

A national political campaign is better than the best circus ever heard of, with a mass baptism and a couple of hangings thrown in.

The average man does not want to be free. he simply wants to be safe.

Nothing transformed the politics, the economy and the table of Europe like the potato. The tuber from Peru.

Freedom of press is limited to those who own one.

The plain message physical science has for the world at large is this, that were our political and social and moral devices only as well contrived to their ends as a linotype machine, an antiseptic operating plant, or an electric tram-car, there need now at the present moment be no appreciable toil in the world.

The Capitol looks beautiful and I am honored to be at work tonight.

Wide differences of opinion in matters of religious, political, and social belief must exist if conscience and intellect alike are not to be stunted, if there is to be room for healthy growth.

I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical.

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies.

Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms of government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.

I don’t get controversial, I don’t get political and I don’t tell you what to do with your life. I just go out there and tell some stories, and people can relate.

Economic distress, political pressure, and social obloquy already drive us from our homes and from our graves. The Jews are already constantly shifting from place to place.

In our personal ambitions, we are individualists. But in our seeking for economic and political progress as a nation, we all go up, or else all go down as one people.

I am not, never have been, and never will be a politician. But I want to tell you the United States has always been proud of having the support of the United Kingdom, of keeping Britain in Europe. We need Britain in Europe

Unless we do things in this country to slow down our population, slow down our birth control, provide better water for people, provide power for people, we’re gonna find out that the next wars are not going to be fought over diamonds, gold and political things.

I’m a very political person, and I think things through clearly, even when I was 18 years old.

I was studying political science; I was adamant that I was going to follow in my father’s footsteps.

There are few, I believe, in this enlightened age, who will not acknowledge that slavery as an institution is a moral and political evil.

Political correctness is what right-wing bigots call what everybody else calls being polite

I think the system is broken; most people think that it’s broken. And we think that what we’re going to do is invigorate the political system and allow for this country to be turned around.

This military strategy is inseparable to implementing political reconciliation in Iraq, there isn’t on one side the military and on the other political.

Only fanatics — in religion as well as in politics — can find a meaning in someone else’s death.

Wherever men and women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must — at that moment — become the center of the universe.

Without social history, economic history is barren and political history is unintelligible.

Nothing uses up alcohol faster than political argument.

Almost any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.

Circumstances give in reality to every political principle its distinguishing color and discriminating effect. The circumstances are what render every civil and political scheme beneficial or noxious to mankind.

Certainly in the next 50 years we shall see a woman president, perhaps sooner than you think. A woman can and should be able to do any political job that a man can do.

I am in the fighting game, I don’t care about anything else. I don’t watch the news, I don’t care about politics, I don’t care about other sports. I don’t care about anything I don’t need to care about. This is my sport, it is my life. I study it, I think about it, all the time. Nothing else matters.

I don’t know why anyone would want to do that politics stuff.

I don’t watch the news, I don’t care about politics, I don’t care about other sports.

Knowledge by itself is not power, but it holds the potential for power if we use it a s a guide for action. Truth will always be defeated by tyranny unless the people are willing to step forward and put their lives into the battle. The future belongs, not to ideas, but to people who act on those ideas.

I think we should all focus on who we are, what we want to do, and do it. That is my way. I don’t know why anyone would want to do that politics stuff.

It isn’t enough just to scream at the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations. We need our political system to start reflect this anger back into, ‘How do we fix it? How do we get the economy going again?’

War should be the politics of last resort. And when we go to war, we should have a purpose that our people understand and support.

Politics is not bean bags. It’s serious, tough stuff.

I hate all politics. I don’t like either political party. One should not belong to them – one should be an individual, standing in the middle. Anyone that belongs to a party stops thinking.

I think our politicians could learn a lot from Mandela.

If somebody’s dumb enough to ask me to go to a political convention and say something, they’re going to have to take what they get.

Politicians love regulating. That’s part of the whole power structure.

The world political system is till based on the concept of the national sovereign state. For the first time therefore, in three hundred years economy and sovereignty are becoming divorced from each other.

It is new design by architects versus world revolution by political leadership.

Doing the right things for the wrong reasons is typical of humanity. Precession – not conscious planning – provides a productive outcome for misguided political and military campaigns.

There is only one revolution tolerable to all men, all societies, all political systems: Revolution by design and invention.

Such a blend of traditions serves to make us stronger, individually and collectively, by providing the ingredients needed for social, political and economic resilience.

Every few hundred years in Western history there occurs a sharp transformation. Within a few short decades, society – its worldview, its basic values, its social and political structures, its art, its key institutions – rearranges itself. We are currently living through such a time.

Democracy cannot consist solely of elections that are nearly always fictitious and managed by rich landowners and professional politicians.

If this political business teaches you one thing, it is that you can be as wise as the wise men of this world, and yet you always wander into the next minute like a child into the dark.

Politics is the womb in which war develops.

To discover how much of our resources must be mobilized for war, we must first examine our political aim and that of the enemy. We must gauge the strength and situation of the opposite state. We must gauge the character and abilities of its government and people and do the same in regard to our own. Finally, we must evaluate the political sympathies of other states and the effect the war may have on them.

If we are not able to ask skeptical questions, to interrogate those who tell us that something is true, to be skeptical of those in authority, then, we are up for grabs for the next charlatan (political or religious) who comes rambling along.

The best political, social, and spiritual work we can do is to withdraw the projection of our shadow onto others

Is it really true that political self-interest is nobler somehow than economic self-interest? . . . And just tell me where in the world you find these angels who are going to organize society for us.

Most of the energy of political work is devoted to correcting the effects of mismanagement of government.

There is only one form of political strategy in which I have any confidence, and that is to try to do the right thing and sometimes be able to succeed

And one of the first and most startling things you find out is, that every individual you encounter in the City of Washington … from the highest bureau chief, clear down to the maid who scrubs Department halls, the night watchmen of the public buildings… represents Political Influence.

Old Glory represents our great American military and their sacrifices to ensure our freedom. This isn’t a political issue. This is about Patriotism, and we need more of it.

You say dabble in Politics? I don’t know what that is. You say stand up and talk for my rights? I know that that is.fdouble

I always cheer up immensely if an attack is particularly wounding because I think, well, if they attack one personally, it means they have not a single political argument left.

We’ve been able to watch on our television screens sophisticated weaponry find a building; and we’ve seen dramatic reports from the front where Pulitzer Prize-to-be winning reporters stood up and declared, the United States is attacked, and all that.

To have built up a new organization, which was not purely political, among negroes in America was a wonderful feat, for the negro politician does not allow any other kind of organization within his race to thrive.

Africa has become the big game of the nation hunters. Today, Africa looms as the greatest commercial, industrial, and political prize in the world.

Listen, Al Gore is a very tough opponent. He is the incumbent. He represents the incumbency. And a challenger is somebody who generally comes from the pack and wins, if you’re going to win. And that’s where I’m coming from.

Taking care of children has nothing to do with politics. I think perhaps with time, instead of there being a politicization of humanitarian aid, there will be a humanization of politics.

But my knowledge of Marxism was limited to knowing that Marx was a Jew, and that he had a long white beard. I said to Lunatcharsky (the political communist commissar for Education, 1918, fh) ‘Whatever you do, don’t ask me why I painted in blue or green, and why you can see a calf inside the cow’s belly, etc. On the other hand you’re welcome: if Marx is so wise, let him come back to life and explain it himself’. I showed him my canvases.

Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.

Not to have a correct political point of view is like having no soul.

War is the highest form of struggle for resolving contradictions, when they have developed to a certain stage, between classes, nations, states, or political groups, and it has existed ever since the emergence of private property and of classes.

All political power comes from the barrel of a gun.

No political party can possibly lead a great revolutionary movement to victory unless it possesses revolutionary theory and knowledge of history and has a profound grasp of the practical movement.

Political work is the life-blood of all economic work.

I’m not into politics, I’m into survival.

Political courage is not political suicide.

Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.

I delight in talking politics. I talk them all day long. But I can’t bear listening to them.

I personally never expected anything of Obama, and wrote about it before the 2008 primaries. I thought it was smoke and mirrors […] I don’t usually admire Sarah Palin, but when she was making fun of this ‘hopey changey’ stuff, she was right, there was nothing there. And it was understood by the people who run the political system, and so it’s no great secret that the US electoral system is mainly a public relations extravaganza…it’s sort of a marketing affair.

The public must be reduced to passivity in the political realm, but for submissiveness to become a reliable trait, it must be entrenched in the realm of belief as well.

There are few genuine conservatives within the U.S. political system, and it is a sign of the intellectual corruption of the age that the honorable term ‘conservatism’ can be appropriated to disguise the advocacy of a powerful, lawless, aggressive and violent state, a welfare state for the rich dedicated to a lunatic form of Keynesian economic intervention that enhances state and private power while mortgaging the country’s future.

It is important to bear in mind that political campaigns are designed by the same people who sell toothpaste and cars.

The artist part of me always wants to be appreciated. I read every review. But I never wanted to seek validation by awards or anything controlled by politics