Watching some of the 9/11 memerial events on tv today got me thinking back to when Bush first visted Ground Zero. He was addressing the crowd on a megaphone and when people complained that they couldn't hear him, he replied (something to the extent of) "Well, I can hear you and the rest of the country hears you. And pretty soon the people who knocked down these building will hear all of us." I think that that sentance stands a strong chance of going down in history as Bush's "defining quote" - the sentence or phrase that will be most associated with him in history. What are some other presidential phrases (famous or infamous) that you can think of? FDR "We have nothing to fear but fear itself!" Kennedy "Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country." Nixon "I am not a crook!" Reagan "Mr. Gorbachev. Tear down this wall!" Bush, Sr. "Read my lips. No new taxes." Clinton "I did not have sex with that woman, Ms Lewinsky!" Any others?
My favorite quote of Bush's, which is of course attributable to some unnamed speechwriter, much like the FDR, JFK & Reagan quotes you listed: "These terrorists kill not merely to end lives but to disrupt and end a way of life. With every atrocity they hope that America grows fearful, retreating from the world and forsaking our friends. They stand against us because we stand in their way. We're not deceived by their pretenses to piety. We have seen their kind before. They are the heirs of all the murderous ideologies of the 20th century. By sacrificing human life to serve their radical visions, by abandoning every value except the will to power, they follow in the path of fascism, Nazism and totalitarianism. And they will follow that path all the way to where it ends: in history's unmarked grave of discarded lies." --From the President's speech to a joint session of Congress, September 21, 2001 Not exactly inspirational, but I saw a replay of the speech earlier this week & it gave me goosebumps all over again.
From W's state of the union address: Terrorists who once occupied Afghanistan now occupy cells at Guantanamo Bay. And terrorist leaders who urged followers to sacrifice their lives are running for their own.
W Bush's quote from the election campaign: 'I will not utilize deficit spending except in times of war or national emergency. The only problem is that he never said it, and it later turned out that it was Gore who made that campaign promise. It's hilarious.
a few good ones I found here "To be prepared for war is one of the most effective means of preserving peace." --George Washington (1790) "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure." --Thomas Jefferson (1787) "The American continents . . . are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers." --James Monroe (1823) "A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free." --Abraham Lincoln (1858) "You can fool all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time." --Abraham Lincoln (1858) "I wish some of you would tell me the brand of whiskey that Grant drinks. I would like to send a barrel of it to my other generals." --Abraham Lincoln (1863) "The war is over - the rebels are our countrymen again." --Ulysses Grant (1865) "Nothing brings out the lower traits of human nature like office seeking." --Rutherford Hayes (1878) "No man is above the law and no man is below it; nor do we ask any man’s permission when we require him to obey it. Obedience to the law is demanded as a right; not asked as a favor." --Theodore Roosevelt (1903) "Americanism is a question of principle, of purpose, of idealism, or character; it is not a matter of birthplace or creed or line of descent." --Theodore Roosevelt (1909) "The world is not going to be saved by legislation." --William Taft (1916) "We must be the great arsenal of democracy." --Franklin D. Roosevelt (1940) "Yesterday, December 7, 1941 - a date which will live in infamy - the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan." --Franklin D. Roosevelt (1941) "I believe this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to earth." --John F. Kennedy (1961) "All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin. And therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words Ich bin ein Berliner." --John F. Kennedy (1961) "I will not seek, and I will not accept the nomination of my party for another term as your president." --Lyndon B. Johnson (1968) "The West will not contain communism, it will transcend communism. We will not bother to denounce it, we’ll dismiss it as a sad, bizarre chapter in human history whose last pages are even now being written." --Ronald Reagan (1981) "The march of freedom and democracy . . . will leave Marxism-Leninism on the ash heap of history as it has left other tyrannies which stifle the freedom and muzzle the self-expression of the people." --Ronald Reagan (1982) "General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall." --Ronald Reagan (1988) Some great quotes.
There are good quotes from Lyndon Johnson other than his announcement not to run again... We did not choose to be the guardians of the gate, but there is no one else. If one morning I walked on top of the water across the Potomac River, the headline that afternoon would read "President Can't Swim". A President's hardest task is not to do what is right, but to know what is right. Did you ever think that making a speech on economics is a lot like pissing down your leg? It seems hot to you, but it never does to anyone else. Greater love hath no man than to attend the Episcopal Church with his wife. I have learned that only two things are necessary to keep one's wife happy. First, let her think she's having her own way. And second, let her have it. I seldom think of politics more than 18 hours a day. (Dubya isn't even awake 18 hours a day ) There are no favorites in my office. I treat them all with the same general inconsideration. The CIA is made up of boys whose families sent them to Princeton but wouldn't let them into the family brokerage business. No member of our generation who wasn't a Communist or a dropout in the thirties is worth a damn.
"The United States is not a nation to which peace is a necessity. " --Grover Cleveland (One of the underrated in my book.) "Any man worth his salt will stick up for what he believes right, but it takes a slightly better man to acknowledge instantly and without reservation that he is in error. " "It is to be regretted that the rich and powerful too often bend the acts of government to their own selfish purposes. " "No one need think that the world can be ruled without blood. The civil sword shall and must be red and bloody." "One man with courage makes a majority." --Andrew Jackson (One of my top five Presidents), who also said something I don't completely agree with but bears some relevance to this board: "It is a damn poor mind indeed which can't think of at least two ways to spell any word. " And finally, here's a link to the Jefferson Digital Archive Quotation page where you can find Jefferson's opinions and ideas on most any subject: http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/foley/
"Possibly my hatred of war blinds me so that I cannot comprehend the arguments that its advocates adduce. But, in my opinion, there is no such thing as a preventative war...War begets the conditions that beget further war."-- Dwight Eisenhower, 1950
"This play is rather boring...I wish something exciting would happen!" Abraham Lincoln: April 14, 1865
The quote I used to have as my signature from Teddy Roosevelt is so inspiring to me...i love the whole "try even though you may look like an idiot" logic!!
What about when Kennedy proudly declared that he was a pastry to an enthusiastic but somewhat confused Berlin crowd? ( A "Berliner" is a pastry, not a resident of Berlin )
Are you referring to the quote that I listed above? "All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin. And therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words Ich bin ein Berliner." --John F. Kennedy (1961) http://urbanlegends.about.com/library/weekly/aa021700a.htm Not True.
Coolidge's wife once asked him what the minister had said in a sermon about sin. His response: "He said he was against it." On another occasion a women told Coolidge that she had made a bet with another woman that she could get him to say more than two words. His response: "You lose." I know those two are correct, but I'm not so sure about this one. Coolidge broke ground at some ground-breaking ceremony and then started to walk off. Someone said to him that it was customary to say a few words. His response: "Nice dirt."