Quotes from Chuck Schumer

Every administration has this idea to talk tough to Israel and make nice to the Arabs and the Palestinians, and that's the way to bring about peace. It's counter-productive - it's actually the opposite.

I believe the war on terror is the vital discussion of this decade and of our generation, probably. To win the war on terror, you need a good offense and a good defense. On defense, I regret to say, basically, this administration has not come close to doing what is necessary.

Well, the tough thing for them is that the Republican primary is pretty far over to the right, just as the Democratic primary is further over to the left than the average voter in each party.

Voters did say 'repeal health care', they did say 'reduce the size of government.' But not a single one of them from the tea party or anywhere said 'give tax breaks to the wealthiest.'

The way to lessen the grip of the Tea Party on the electoral process would be to do what a handful have done and have a primary where all voters, members of every party, can vote, and the top two vote-getters then enter a runoff.

Inaction is perhaps the greatest mistake of all.

I'm totally opposed to vouchers. I will fight them tooth and nail.

The bottom line is there are lots of problems that were not created by government. The biggest one is loss of middle class incomes, loss of good-paying jobs which was created by technology and globalization. Above all, when you can move a job to China or India, it reduces wages.

The vast majority of the people employed by Wall Street are the secretary who goes in to work on the Long Island Rail Road, who makes fifty, sixty, seventy thousand dollars a year.

You do have to change things as warfare changes.

Ideological warriors whether from the Left or the Right are bad news for the bench. They tend to make law, not interpret law. And that's not what any of us should want from our judges.

In today's competitive economy, to stand still is to die.

America is a place where we all come together. It is a place of consensus.

The fundamental weakness in the Tea Party machine is the stark difference between what the leaders of the Tea Party elite - plutocrats like the Koch Brothers -want and what the average grassroots Tea Party follower wants.

Bigotry has always been the poison of America, and we oughta do everything to eradicate it with no excuses or explanations.

I told the President, I told Rahm Emanuel and others in the administration that I thought the policy they took to try to bring about negotiations is counter-productive, because when you give the Palestinians hope that the United States will do its negotiating for them, they are not going to sit down and talk.

Giving up even an ounce of precious freedom is a very serious thing to do.

There are some tax expenditures that are there for very obvious and very important and very good policy reasons. Whether it's the charitable deduction or the deduction for homes, it's not a loophole.

When Mitt Romney says he wants to reform the tax code, hold on to your wallets. We know Mitt Romney never met a tax haven he didn't like. But his new favorite tax haven is actually not the Cayman Islands - its Paul Ryan's budget.

To introduce a whole new tax regime, that would be modern tax reform. But that's too big a task.

The Tea Party people are ideologues. They are right, and no one can change their minds. There is no reason for compromise.

The Tea Party elites gained extraordinary influence by being able to funnel millions of undisclosed dollars into campaigns with ads that distort the truth and attack government.

I think teaching should be an exalted profession, not a picked-on profession.

I want to attract the best people into teaching.