Quotes About Manipulation

Trump made sure both the media and his opponents reacted on his terms. He wasn't always perfectly prepared, but his preference for speed over perfection ensured that opponents were always scrambling to figure out a response. •

Trump having the ability to trick a mob of rubes into storming the Capitol wasn't a reason to stop enabling him, it was more evidence that his mob must be obeyed.

We were handing out little key bumps of cocaine, turning our own supporters into addicts, and then telling ourselves there wasn't a problem. They just need another bump to stay level. And another. And another.

Donald Trump was the snake. Everyone knew he was the snake. He told us he was the snake. Yet when the snake offered his spoiled fruit, these otherwise intelligent people took from the tree and ate it.

Politics was manipulation. Like a magic show.

On occasions the war was like a Ping-Pong ball. You could put fancy spin on it, you could make it dance.

This baby is a daughter of the goddess, and so she's a T-H-R-E-A-T to them, you bet. A big threat. She could bounce the King, if she grows up, which…certain persons…would like her not to do. And there's other people who want her to grow up but would want to, what, be her manager, you know? Boss her, use her. Climb into the tower by means of her Rapunzel hair, yes, sir. Right into that tower." Scott

Power is the capacity to turn people into money.

You can hide in someone else's rage - it blinds them

But the right won't tell us that, because to put the blame where it belongs, on deregulation rather than regulation, on greedy companies and individuals who are of means, rather than poor black and brown people, would hardly serve the right's goal; namely, the manipulation of our racial anxiety and resentments into a potent political weapon.

No, truth never gained anyone anything. All it did was anger those who preferred lies and confusion and backspinning in the hope of making themselves look better.

A man, I'd sometimes thought, who would apologize for the inconvenience as he broke your neck.

On the contrary," Thrawn corrected coolly. "Not only will they fall for it, they'll be utterly destroyed by it. Watch, Captain. And learn.

I'm a snake. My skin is cold. I have no heart. I slither…looking for prey with the tip of my tongue. I swallow the people I care about whole. That's the kind of creature I am. Don't you remember?

In valuing the image over the word, we fall victim to the image's appearance of full revelation. Whereas the word prompts suspicion and questioning, the image produces belief and devotion. It is in this sense that Gilroy sees a latent fascism in the contemporary elevation of the image. The image today signifies the possibility of a completely successful process of manipulation.

You have agency, yes, but what of it? It is just a game. But when a game does this well, you lose track of your manipulation of it, and its manipulation of you, and instead feel inserted so deeply inside the game that your mind, and your feelings, become as seemingly crucial to its operation as its many millions of lines of code. It is the sensation that the game itself is as suddenly, unknowably alive as you are.

Your Highness, what do you call it when a high-ranking person lies right in your face?" the President asked with a wry smile. "Diplomacy.

that one must know something of the truth in order to lie convincingly.

He was a person whose universe was very small indeed. It held only one person, himself, surrounded by things whose sole function was to be manipulated for his amusement or profit.

Everything was politics, and politics was ideology, and ideology came down to personal prejudices rather than the quest for truth.

After three weeks in this environment, Sally was probably doing the cutest curtsies in the history of Western Civilization. By this time the Palace staff was probably fighting for the right to look after her. Sally was a true daddy's girl. The ability to manipulate the people around her came easily. She'd practiced on her father for years.

This wasn't a mere can of worms. It was a can of poisonous snakes that Ryan had spilled over Murray's desk.

It's hard to say who's a greater threat to the world, an ambitious CEO with a big ad budget or a crafty cleric with an obsolete Bible verse.

There're many ways, my dear, to victimize people. The most insidious way is to persuade them that they're victims.