Quotes from Madeleine K. Albright

SENATOR JOSEPH MCCARTHY—ANGRY, JOWLY, AND PERPETUALLY indignant—had the instincts of a Mussolini, but without the intellectual foundation. Like Il Duce, he was a showman who loved politics and craved power. Unlike him, he began his public life largely ignorant of policy.

The Nuremberg trials established the principle that neither "obeying the law" nor "following orders" is a sufficient legal defense for those accused of violating basic standards of civilization.

Democracy is not only a form of state, it is not just something that is embodied in a constitution; democracy is a view of life, it requires a belief in human beings, in humanity. . . . I have already said that democracy is a discussion. But the real discussion is possible only if people trust each other and if they try fairly to find the truth.

Respect for the rights of others is a lofty principle; but envy is a primal urge (p114)

I continue to believe that the United States banked enough international goodwill in the interval between George Washington and Barack Obama to recover from the present embarrassment—but I am not sure how extensive or lasting the harm will be, hence the worries.

a Fascist who launches his career by being voted into office will have a claim to legitimacy that others do not.

Historian Robert Paxton begins one of his books by asserting: "Fascism was the major political innovation of the twentieth century, and the source of much of its pain.

How can one be bored in a world where a billion examples of human ingenuity, peculiarity, pigheadedness, and compassion are on regular view?

Until I am carried out, I will carry on.

The United States has had flawed presidents before; in fact, we have never had any other kind, but we have not had a chief executive in the modern era whose statements and actions are so at odds with democratic ideals.

The Nazis chased the dream of a racially pure society through occupation and conquest, thus ensuring intimate contact with people of many non-Germanic nationalities and races. The Communists insisted that national identity was irrelevant but obsessively persecuted men and women because of who they were: Latvians, Poles, Ukrainians, Armenians, Finns, Chechens, Koreans, and Turks.

WITH COMMUNISM NO LONGER VIABLE, THE DEFAULT RALLYING CRY for an autocratic Russian leader is nationalism. Putin, with his staged military parades and frequent invocation of past heroics, sounds that trumpet repeatedly. He wants citizens to believe that only he can restore his country to its rightful position in world affairs. If that means playing a little rough, so be it

Repeat a lie often enough and it begins to sound as if it must—or at least might—be so.

Fascism did not die with Mussolini," he warned. "Hitler is finished, but the seeds spread by his disordered mind have firm root in too many fanatical brains.

THOMAS EDISON HAILED HIM AS THE "GENIUS OF THE MODERN age"; Gandhi, as a "superman." Winston Churchill pledged to stand by him in his "struggle against the bestial appetites of Leninism." Newspapers in Rome, host to the Vatican, referred to him as "the incarnation of God." In the end, people who had worshipped his every move hung his corpse upside down next to his mistress's near a gas station in Milan.

He used simple words and did not hesitate to tell what he later described as "colossal untruths." He sought to incite hatred toward those he considered traitors—the "November criminals" whose treachery had cost Germany the war—and he returned each day to what Nietzsche had called the ideology "of those who feel cheated": anti-Semitism.

the People Power movement that in 1986 foiled Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos's effort to steal a "snap" presidential election;

THE WAR OF WILLS BETWEEN HUNGARY AND POLAND ON ONE SIDE and the EU on the other is an important test of where extreme nationalism will lead.

Though I had never written a memoir, I was confident that given enough time, I could do a serviceable job. Not elegant, but blunt, informative and funnier than most readers would expect.

the Fascist game plan: a single party, speaking with one voice, controlling every state institution, claiming to represent all people, and labeling the entire sham a triumph of the popular will.

Among those welcoming Fascism and shouting "Viva Mussolini" that day were two hundred Jews.

the conservatives saw the Fascist leader as someone they could hide behind, manipulate, and, when convenient, replace.

For the DPRK and its military, the ouster of Saddam Hussein conveyed a powerful message: it's not enough to pretend to have weapons of mass destruction. To be secure, a nation must build them, own them, and hide them.

The ability of a free and independent press to hold political leaders accountable is what makes open government possible—it is the heartbeat of democracy. Trump is intent on stilling, or slowing down, that heartbeat. This is a gift to dictators, and coming from a chief executive of the United States, cause for shame.