Quotes About Politics

Howarth began to see that, however much it was against ones will and convictions, sides had to be taken, the dreary corrupt world of politics had to be entered by the good and dispassionate, to protect and avenge the weak. But one always entered too late.

I can't stand politicians who wear God on their sleeves.

There were people who got me very involved in politics. But then there was also a book. It was a trilogy, a biography of Trotsky by Isaac Deutscher, which made a very deep impression on me and gave me a love of political biography for the rest of my life.

I thought that it was the most predictable speech that we could have heard from the right hon. and learned Gentleman. He may want to pose as the nice Dr. Jekyll, but we know that, deep down, he is still the same old Mr. Howard.

Before people crow about the absence of Weapons of Mass Destruction, I suggest they wait a bit.

If only Nixon could go to China, only Obama can end the self-memorialization obsession that is presidential libraries - by not building such a shrine.

But on most days, especially the warm ones, life exhausts him; the worsening traffic and graffiti and company politics, everyone grousing about bonuses, benefits, overtime. Sometimes in the slow heat of summer, long before dawn, Volkheimer paces in the harsh dazzle of the billboard light and feels his loneliness on him like a disease.

But on most days, especially the warm ones, life exhausts him; the worsening traffic and graffiti and company politics, everyone grousing about bonuses, benefits, overtime.

If you had to choose between art and the slogan, or between history and the slogan, you might as well choose the slogan and have done with pretending even to care about art and history. The reduction of all things to politics must reduce them, in their own right, to irrelevance.

It is precisely because we believe in democracy as a talisman, a heal-all, that we are prone to the disintegration of language that characterizes Life Under Compulsion. It

I am saying rather that men did not behave as men are wont to do, in part because of the essential change in political bodies, where everyone senses that protection at all costs, rather than the good and bloody battle, is the rule of the day. As soon as someone says, "You want 200,000 people to die," the chance for a discussion is over, because the rejoinder, "You are speaking like a coward and an ass," is no longer possible.

vital political truth: military victory can be secured only by reconciliation with the defeated. Although most empire-builders in the ancient world

UNFINISHED BUSINESS 46–44 B.C.

he was also convinced that a strong executive authority should replace the incompetent competitive cockpit of Senatorial government.

and called for Augustus to be appointed dictator.

In 35 B.C., Sextus Pompeius was executed, presumably with Antony's approval.

but to bear in mind what Caesar, who had eliminated all his enemies, suffered at the hands of his closest friends.

Antony was eventually persuaded to back Octavian and abandon any thought of going over to Sextus.

Caesar himself almost certainly did not aim at kingship.

in February of 44 B.C. he had himself declared dictator for life.

This was Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica ("big nose"). A senior politician who had held all the great offices of state and was now pontifex maximus, or high priest, he had a high opinion of himself: at a noisy public meeting, he once said, "Be quiet, please, citizens. I know more about the public interest than you do.

His first task was to prevent Brutus and Cassius from taking over Greece

Men pressed around Caesar in a tight scrum as each tried to stab him;

Political debate became polarized into bitter conflicts, with radical outsiders trying to press change on conservative insiders who, in the teeth of all the evidence, believed that all was for the best under the best of all possible constitutions.