Quotes from Colin Powell

Drones are just another weapon, and they turn out to be a very effective weapon that puts no American troops at risk, and I don't see why we shouldn't use them against identified enemy targets.

The ties that bind us are stronger than the occasional stresses that separate us.

The healthiest competition occurs when average people win by putting above average effort.

Failure is a part of life and you have to learn to deal with it. Failure is something that is part of life's cycle and it's from failure that you gain life experience.

We got rid of a terrible dictator. We gave the Iraqi people an opportunity for a new life under a representative form of government.

I have found that leadership is leadership is leadership. It applies whether you are in government or in corporate life or in non-profit life.

The bottom line in all of it is that, in life, it's all about people.

Wouldn't it be great if we could look forward to a whole world in which no child will be left behind?

When you decide to get involved in a military operation in a place like Syria, you've got to be prepared, as we learned from Iraq and Afghanistan, to become the government, and I'm not sure any country, either the United States or I don't hear of anyone else, who's willing to take on that responsibility.

Bad news isn't wine. It doesn't improve with age.

It's nice to say let's be bipartisan. But we're a partisan nation. We were raised as a partisan nation.

People have asked me, 'What would you have done if you hadn't gone into the Army?' I'd say I'd probably be a bus driver. I don't know.

Avoid having your ego so close to your position that when your position falls, your ego goes with it.

The idea that putting Americans 'first' requires a withdrawal from the world is simply wrongheaded because a retreat would achieve exactly the opposite for our citizens.

If a leader doesn't convey passion and intensity then there will be no passion and intensity within the organization and they'll start to fall down and get depressed.

Get mad, then get over it.

It's not just a matter of whether you support Obama or Romney. It's who they have coming with them. I always keep my powder dry, as they say in the military.

When Jerry Springer thinks you've gone too far, my friends, you have gone too far.

Too often we act - ask our schools to be truant officers, our teachers to be truant officers, because we're giving them children who have, you know, they're not ready to learn. And if they're not ready to learn by the third grade, they know they're behind.

Today I can declare my hope and declare it from the bottom of my heart that we will eventually see the time when that number of nuclear weapons is down to zero and the world is a much better place.

The only bipartisanship you ever see is when they finally sign a bill and everybody says, 'Gee, isn't that wonderful?'

In other words, don't expect to always be great. Disappointments, failures and setbacks are a normal part of the lifecycle of a unit or a company and what the leader has to do is constantly be up and say 'we have a problem, let's go and get it'.

We all hoped in 2001 that we could put in place an Afghan government under President Karzai that would be able to control the country, make sure al-Qaeda didn't come back, and make sure the Taliban wasn't resurging. It didn't work out.

90 percent of my time is spent on 10 percent of the world.