You cannot win a battle in any arena merely by defending yourself.
Once one determines that he or she has a mission in life, that’s it’s not going to be accomplished without a great deal of pain, and that the rewards in the end may not outweigh the pain -if you recognize historically that always happens, then when it comes, you survive it.
You’ve got to learn to survive a defeat. That’s when you develop character.
But more than anything else, we have learned that legal assistance for the poor, when properly provided, is one of the most constructive ways to help them help themselves.
There is no such thing as a nonpolitical speech by a politician.
People react to fear, not love; they don’t teach that in Sunday School, but it’s true.
The lesson of all history warns us that we should negotiate only when our military superiority is so convincing that we can achieve our objective at the conference table, and deny the aggressor theirs.
In the long term we can hope that religion will change the nature of man and reduce conflict. But history is not encouraging in this respect. The bloodiest wars in history have been religious wars.
I know you heard what you thought I said, but what I said isn’t what I meant.
I don’t give a damn about the civilians.
The important thing is that we maintain plausible deniability.
Maybe New York shouldn’t survive. Maybe it should go through a cycle of destruction.
Because of the realities of human nature, perfect peace is achieved in two places only: in the grave and at the typewriter.
Peace demands more, not less, from a people. Peace lacks the clarity of purpose and the cadence of war. War is scripted: peace is improvisation.
I let the American people down, and I have to carry that burden for the rest of my life. My political life is over. I will never again have an opportunity to serve in any official position. Maybe I can give a little advice from time to time.
In our own lives, let each of us asknot just what government will do for me, but what can I do for myself?
Before we become too arrogant with the most deadly of the seven deadly sins, the sin of pride, let us remember that the two great wars of this century, wars which cost twenty million dead, were fought between Christian nations praying to the same God.
Millions who endure poverty and bad government can now know what they are missing. To see how the other half lives all they have to do is switch on their television sets.
History is a pathetic junkyard of broken treaties.
Peace is a great goal, but it is not a panacea. Neither is material wealth.