Quotes from Michael Nutter

You know, public service is serious enough on its own, and what I've found is if you take yourself take yourself too seriously in this business, you'll lose sight of what it is that you're trying to get done. So I mean I've tried to have the proper mix of being a serious public servant, but also still being a regular guy.

I'm honored to serve as mayor of my hometown where our founders started America with three simple words: 'We, the people.' And when they said 'people' they didn't mean 'corporations.'

Part of the problem in politics is that people only look at the next four to eight years: kick the can down the road and say, 'Hey, it's the next person's problem.'

A father is a person who's around, participating in a child's life. He's a teacher who helps to guide and shape and mold that young person, someone for that young person to talk to, to share with, their ups and their downs, their fears and their concerns.

Somehow, someway, for some people there's an automatic assumption that a mayor who is African-American or some other elected official has to support another African-American.

Our economy grows from the middle out, not the top down.

Whether it's on the streets of Philadelphia or New York or Chicago or Atlanta or in a classroom in Newtown, Connecticut, people want to be safe.

Everyone felt comfortable with these guys and what their vision was, and when they said they want to keep the staff intact, that was very encouraging.

The federal government... knows how to put a missile in someone's room half way around the world with technology. Why don't we use some of that technology to save some lives here in America?

Parents who neglect their children, who don't know where they are, who don't know what they're doing, who don't know who they're hanging out with, you're gonna find yourselves spending some quality time with your kids, in jail, together.

Mayors are leaders, doers. We get things done, and we are moving America's cities forward.

Yes we need enhanced border control. Yes we need to focus our efforts on those who pose a threat to our country. But let's not fall into the trap set by the Tea Party and others who would tell you that every single undocumented individual is a drug smuggler, a terrorist, or a threat to the American way of life. That is simply not true.

What the mayors care about is, 'How can I get money to invest in the infrastructure in my city? How do we put people back to work, lower the unemployment rate, provide for job training programs? How do we make class sizes smaller and make investments in our children from an education standpoint?'

I didn't run for mayor to be the caretaker of the status quo.

For those of us in the political business, generally, it's been pretty much an unwritten but understood rule that family and children are out of bounds, that you don't attack someone's family.

If you have a deep-seated need to be loved and admired every day, you shouldn't be in politics. You should go work at a pet store.

I think there is a big difference between expressing the pain and anger that many African Americans and other people of color may feel versus language that I think now crosses the line and goes into hate.

Vice President Biden is the real deal. He'll give it to you straight. He communicates in a way that I think connects with people at a real level.

In Philadelphia, our public safety, poverty reduction, health and economic development all start with education. We can't grow the middle class if we don't give our kids the tools they need to innovate and invent.

I think that when we have a better educated society, when there is less violence in our cities, when people get back into the workforce and have the opportunity to take care of themselves and their families - that for me really is the kind of success and the kind of America that I think most of us still want, we aspire to.

The federal government... knows how to put a missile in someone's room half way around the world with technology. Why don't we use some of that technology to save some lives here in America?

I think there is a big difference between expressing the pain and anger that many African Americans and other people of color may feel versus language that I think now crosses the line and goes into hate.

Mayors could never get away with the kind of nonsense that goes on in Washington. In our world, you either picked up the trash or you didn't. You either moved an abandoned car or you didn't. You either filled a pothole or you didn't. That's what we do every day. And we know how to get this stuff done.

The computer is your passport, not only to the future but to knowing what's going around you.