Quotes from Jared Cohen

Kids are coming online and connecting at a pace that's faster than their physical maturation process. Would you ever imagine that you'd have to talk to your kid about phishing before you're talking to him about the birds and the bees?

I want to use the best technology we have at our disposal to begin to take on trolling and other nefarious tactics that give hostile voices disproportionate weight. To do everything we can to level the playing field.

We live in a world where all wars will begin as cyber wars... It's the combination of hacking and massive, well-coordinated disinformation campaigns.

It is difficult to predict technology more than 10 years out with any certitude, but what I observe is that change and innovation happens earlier and faster than we expect. We are constantly surprised at what technology can do.

If you're not creating waves, then you're not pushing enough.

the 21st Century is really a terrible time to be a control freak.

If anybody really wanted to shoot the president of the United States," Kennedy told his aide Kenneth O'Donnell on the morning of November 22, "it was not a very difficult job—all one had to do was get a high building someday with a telescopic rifle, and there was nothing anybody could do to defend against such an attempt.

as a general proposition, until very recently, vice presidents have always been excluded because it is unsettling to have someone around you whose happiest moment will be when you drop dead.

I didn't want any surprises; I churlishly thought if I revealed my Judaism at McDonald's, I would somehow be protected by the friendly American forces of crispy chicken sandwiches and supersized French fries.

In September 1919, Woodrow Wilson suffered a series of debilitating strokes that should have led to his resignation. For over a month, the president was so sick that he received no visitors and his wife, Edith Galt, and physician, Dr. Cary Grayson, essentially took over the affairs of state.

My personal pride must not be allowed to stand in the way of my duty to the country. If I am only half efficient, I should turn the office over to the vice president. If it is going to take much time for me to recover my health and strength, the country cannot afford to wait for me.

Everything FDR did was deliberate, particularly in politics. The leaders admired him, but they didn't trust him. They viewed him as "warm-hearted in everything but politics and there he was cold-blooded

the "Truman Doctrine," setting the precedent that it would be "the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures.

Unlike Lyndon Johnson, who would later be swayed by the influence of Kennedy's advisors on Vietnam, Truman developed an independent view.

With heightened tensions at home and abroad, he had a weak track record on both fronts. Soaring rhetoric was one thing, but when it came to policy, he had floundered. From the Bay of Pigs fiasco to his window dressing on civil rights, his presidency lacked any significant accomplishment.

Harry Truman had no middle name, just an initial "S," which was a reference to his two grandfathers, Solomon Young and Anderson Shipp Truman.

After briefly acknowledging the tragedy of his predecessor's passing, he called for an increase in the size of the Navy, avoidance of public debt during peacetime, stabilization of the currency, and greater scrutiny over abuse of public offices.

Cyber weapons won't go away, and their spread can't be controlled. Instead, as we've done for other destructive technologies, the world needs to establish a set of principles to determine the proper conduct of governments regarding cyber conflict.

Iranian young people are one of the most pro-American populations in the Middle East.

The number of people who believe in stopping violence in the world is wildly greater than those that want to perpetrate it. When everybody has a smartphone, the ability for people to actually do something about violence goes up significantly.

The intensity of cyber conflict around the world is increasing, and the tools are becoming cheaper and more readily available.

I dislike the phrase 'social media.' 'Social media' is merely a way to describe new tools in an old and narrow paradigm where we measure success by how many people are reached.

Technology is a tool, and it's a platform. Nobody gets arrested for being a blogger; people get arrested for dissent. Nobody gets arrested for putting information about themselves online; they get arrested for being an activist. I'm a strong believer in the fact that you should not blame the tools; you should blame the circumstances.

The 21st century is a really terrible time to be a control freak.