YUKS
Quotes page 10
Harry Truman
Said:
A bureaucrat is a Democrat who holds some office that a
Republican wants.
A leader in the
Democratic Party is a boss, in the Republican Party he is a leader.
A pessimist is
one who makes difficulties of his opportunities and an optimist is one who makes
opportunities of his difficulties.
A politician is
a man who understands government and it takes a politician to run a government.
A statesman is a politician who's been dead ten or fifteen years.
A politician is
a man who understands government. A statesman is a politician who's been dead
for 15 years.
A President
cannot always be popular.
A president
either is constantly on top of events or, if he hesitates, events will soon be
on top of him. I never felt that I could let up for a moment.
A President
needs political understanding to run the government, but he may be elected
without it.
Actions are the
seed of fate deeds grow into destiny.
All my life,
whenever it comes time to make a decision, I make it and forget about it.
All the
president is, is a glorified public relations man who spends his time
flattering, kissing, and kicking people to get them to do what they are supposed
to do anyway.
Always be
sincere, even if you don't mean it.
America was not
built on fear. America was built on courage, on imagination and an unbeatable
determination to do the job at hand.
Any man who has
had the job I've had and didn't have a sense of humor wouldn't still be here.
Art is
parasitic on life, just as criticism is parasitic on art.
Being too good
is apt to be uninteresting.
Carry the
battle to them. Don't let them bring it to you. Put them on the defensive and
don't ever apologize for anything.
Experience has
shown how deeply the seeds of war are planted by economic rivalry and social
injustice.
I do not
believe there is a problem in this country or the world today which could not be
settled if approached through the teaching of the Sermon on the Mount.
I had faith in
Israel before it was established, I have in it now. I believe it has a glorious
future before it - not just another sovereign nation, but as an embodiment of
the great ideals of our civilization.
I have found
the best way to give advice to your children is to find out what they want and
then advise them to do it.
I have no
desire to crow over anybody or to see anybody eating crow, figuratively or
otherwise. We should all get together and make a country in which everybody can
eat turkey whenever he pleases.
I never did
give anybody hell. I just told the truth and they thought it was hell.
I never gave
anybody hell! I just told the truth and they thought it was hell.
I remember when
I first came to Washington. For the first six months you wonder how the hell you
ever got here. For the next six months you wonder how the hell the rest of them
ever got here.
I would rather
have peace in the world than be President.
I've said many
a time that I think the Un-American Activities Committee in the House of
Representatives was the most un-American thing in America!
If I hadn't
been President of the United States, I probably would have ended up a piano
player in a bawdy house.
If I'd known
how much packing I'd have to do, I'd have run again.
If you can't
convince them, confuse them.
If you can't
stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.
In my opinion
eight years as president is enough and sometimes too much for any man to serve
in that capacity.
In reading the
lives of great men, I found that the first victory they won was over
themselves... self-discipline with all of them came first.
Intense feeling
too often obscures the truth.
It is amazing
what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.
It is
understanding that gives us an ability to have peace. When we understand the
other fellow's viewpoint, and he understands ours, then we can sit down and work
out our differences.
It sure is hell
to be president.
It's a
recession when your neighbor loses his job; it's a depression when you lose
yours.
It's plain
hokum. If you can't convince 'em, confuse 'em. It's an old political trick. But
this time it won't work.
Men make
history and not the other way around. In periods where there is no leadership,
society stands still. Progress occurs when courageous, skillful leaders seize
the opportunity to change things for the better.
Most of the
problems a President has to face have their roots in the past.
My choice early
in life was either to be a piano-player in a whorehouse or a politician. And to
tell the truth, there's hardly any difference.
My father was
not a failure. After all, he was the father of a president of the United States.
Nixon is one of
the few in the history of this country to run for high office talking out of
both sides of his mouth at the same time and lying out of both sides.
Richard Nixon
is a no good, lying bastard. He can lie out of both sides of his mouth at the
same time, and if he ever caught himself telling the truth, he'd lie just to
keep his hand in.
Study men, not
historians.
The atom bomb
was no "great decision." It was merely another powerful weapon in the
arsenal of righteousness.
The best way to
give advice to your children is to find out what they want and then advise them
to do it.
The buck stops
here!
The human
animal cannot be trusted for anything good except en masse. The combined thought
and action of the whole people of any race, creed or nationality, will always
point in the right direction.
The Marine
Corps is the Navy's police force and as long as I am President that is what it
will remain. They have a propaganda machine that is almost equal to Stalin's.
The only things
worth learning are the things you learn after you know it all.
The President
is always abused. If he isn't, he isn't doing anything.
The reward of
suffering is experience.
The United
Nations is designed to make possible lasting freedom and independence for all
its members.
The White House
is the finest prison in the world.
There is
nothing new in the world except the history you do not know.
This
administration is going to be cussed and discussed for years to come.
Those who want
the Government to regulate matters of the mind and spirit are like men who are
so afraid of being murdered that they commit suicide to avoid assassination.
To hell with
them. When history is written they will be the sons of bitches - not I.
Upon books the
collective education of the race depends; they are the sole instruments of
registering, perpetuating and transmitting thought.
Washington is a
very easy city for you to forget where you came from and why you got there in
the first place.
We shall never
be able to remove suspicion and fear as potential causes of war until
communication is permitted to flow, free and open, across international
boundaries.
Well, I
wouldn't say that I was in the great class, but I had a great time while I was
trying to be great.
When even one
American - who has done nothing wrong - is forced by fear to shut his mind and
close his mouth - then all Americans are in peril.
When you get to
be President, there are all those things, the honors, the twenty-one gun
salutes, all those things. You have to remember it isn't for you. It's for the
Presidency.
When you have
an efficient government, you have a dictatorship.
Whenever a
fellow tells me he's bipartisan, I know he's going to vote against me.
Whenever you
put a man on the Supreme Court he ceases to be your friend.
You and I are
stuck with the necessity of taking the worst of two evils or none at all. So-I'm
taking the immature Democrat as the best of the two. Nixon is impossible.
You can always
amend a big plan, but you can never expand a little one. I don't believe in
little plans. I believe in plans big enough to meet a situation which we can't
possibly foresee now.
You can never
get all the facts from just one newspaper, and unless you have all the facts,
you cannot make proper judgements about what is going on.
You know that
being an American is more than a matter of where your parents came from. It is a
belief that all men are created free and equal and that everyone deserves an
even break.
You want a
friend in Washington? Get a dog.