Quotes from Chris Matthews

He was making the inevitable pivot from critic to manager.

The author attributes part of the Carter-Reagan divide to their respective attitudes toward the city from which they governed. Carter was deeply suspicious of its coziness. Reagan intended to enjoy his temporary home even while delivering it from its reigning ideology.

Don't have a reputation for being a nice guy—that won't do you any good Muskie was the best of them all, the absolute best, because nobody wanted to tangle with the guy. You know, why tangle with the guy? Why ruin your day? A bad temper is a very powerful political tool because most people don't like confrontation.

Even the bureaucracy does not shatter the stillness.

Historically, the coupling of president and Speaker has been a tricky one that encourages a choreography both quick-footed and wary

Tip, if I had a ticket to heaven and you didn't have one too, I would give mine away and go to hell with you. Ronald Reagan

For Reagan,for his contemporaries, and many in the generations after them, the word Munich was understood as code for any nation's stepping back from necessary toughness

the Senate in 1958. He was the

O'Neill was perceptive enough to understand the country had a new leader that it wanted to believe in. After the tragedy of Dallas, after the quicksand of Vietnam, the scandal of Watergate, and the "malaise" of Jimmy Carter, it needed one.

As he had all his life, Jack found refuge from his health worries in the power of words and ideas. Reading remained his salvation, and not just the daily newspapers that are the daily fare of most politicians. p108

Staffers tend to mimic their bosses, to take their key from them.

My priority is to see that some people don't suffer for the good of others.

on-air appearance you could see that the secretary of state

In politics there is a large difference between loosing and being defeated.

The author contrasts leadership styles he describes as wholesale and retail. The whole sale leader rallies groups to an overriding vision, and to him individuals are interchangeable. The retail leader knows everyone's details and uses personal touches to motivate.

Well, the right-wing policy with regard to Israel - the people who don't want to deal with Arafat, who don't want a Palestinian state - the whole sort of right-wing view is consistent with the view toward Iraq. It's the same policy and the same people.

I can't find a reason to be for this war. I've looked, and I can't, so I'm not.

The more failure you can accept, the greater your chance of success.

John Paul II spoke to the commoner and to the king, to the tyrant and to the democrat in that same language of freedom.