Quotes About Politics

Elections are supposed to be political occasions. In fact the opposite is true. The last thing politicians want to talk about at election-time is politics. What they want to talk about is votes. And the less you talk about politics, the more votes you're likely to win - otherwise you might offend someone.

Political bargaining and political entrepreneurship can be seen naked, stripped of the flattering wardrobe of democracy, rule of law and state building.

Most members of the political elites of north-east Africa have come to resemble gangsters rather than civic political leaders.

No matter what tribe you are in - you've got to hand it to the architects of the Brexit Referendum. Taking an incredibly complex decision and reducing it to a Yay or Nay vote is the perfect divide-and-conquer strategy. At a time when the 99% need to rise up against the 1% we are split right down the middle. An absolute guarantee of little change, ever.

I never graduated from Iowa, but I was only there for two terms - Truman's and Eisenhower's.

Optimism is a political act. Those who benefit from the status quo are perfectly happy for us to think nothing is going to get any better. In fact, these days, cynicism is obedience.

That politics is showbusiness for ugly people is well known – what's less understood is that it is high society for the socially awkward.

Away with the hypocritical horror on the part of capitalist, labor leader, and politician.

These days even mere attempts to improve capitalism are often called 'Socialism,' while in reality they are only reforms.

You have to look at the history of the Middle East in particular. It has been one of failure and frustration, of feudalism and tribalism.

Even to observe neutrality you must have a strong government.

We are now forming a republican government. Real liberty is neither found in despotism or the extremes of democracy, but in moderate governments.

In politics, as in religion, it is equally absurd to aim at making proselytes by fire and sword. Heresies in either can rarely be cured by persecution.

Why has government been instituted at all? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice, without constraint.

Divide et impera must be the motto of every nation that either hates or fears us.

The masses are asses.

Men of factious tempers, of local prejudices, or of sinister designs, may, by intrigue, by corruption, or by other means, first obtain the suffrages, and then betray the interests, of the people.

To judge from the conduct of the opposite parties, we shall be led to conclude that they will mutually hope to evince the justness of their opinions, and to increase the number of their converts by the loudness of their declamations and the bitterness of their invectives.

But the most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property.

It is too early for politicians to presume on our forgetting that the public good, the real welfare of the great body of the people, is the supreme object to be pursued;

For in politics, as in religion, it is equally absurd to aim at making proselytes by fire and sword. Heresies in either can rarely be cured by persecution. And

A dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the people.

Alexander Hamilton

It is a sound and important principle that the representative ought to be acquainted with the interests and circumstances of his constituents.