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E. J. Dionne

E. J. Dionne Quotes

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“The new culture war is about national identity rather than religion and 'transcendent authority.' It focuses on which groups the United States will formally admit to residence and citizenship. It asks the same question as the old culture war: 'Who are we?' But the earlier query was primarily about how we define ourselves morally. The new question is about how we define ourselves ethnically, racially and linguistically. It is, in truth, one of the oldest questions in our history, going back to our earliest immigration battles of the 1840s and 1850s.”

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Author:E. J. Dionne
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“Liberals and conservatives disagree over what are the most important sins. For conservatives, the sins that matter are personal irresponsibility, the flight from family life, sexual permissiveness, the failure of individuals to work hard. For liberals, the gravest sins are intolerance, a lack of generosity toward the needy, narrow-mindedness toward social and racial minorities.”

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Book:Why Americans Hate Politics
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“God forbid that Americans earning, say, more than $1 million a year be asked to pony up a little more in taxes to support a larger military at a time when, we are told over and over, the country is in the middle of a war on terror. Millionaires can't be asked to sacrifice even just a little bit. No, they deserve to have their taxes cut while others fight and die.”

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“Here you had John McCain and Lindsey Graham in a very principled way standing up and defending Barack Obama. You had people like Gene Robinson and a lot of other liberals, who said, and this I personally agree with, however flawed Rand Paul was as a messenger, we need a debate about this. The administration has not been forthcoming enough about its drone policy.”

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Author:E. J. Dionne
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“The New York Times had a headline on its website - Trump Turning To Ultra Wealthy To Steer Economic Policy. This doesn't sound very populist to me. Today's commerce secretary, the names being talked about for treasury secretary, I think there will be populist talk but maybe no populist action.”

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Author:E. J. Dionne
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“On the question of opposition, I think there are - when you want to send a signal if you're on the Democratic side that this is a very right wing cabinet at odds with so much of what [Donald] Trump said. And it's also going to be fascinating to see if your Republican Party in the congress actually goes along with those aspects of the Trump plan that are designed to raise wages.”

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“[ Donald Trump is] candidate who said he has more confidence in Vladimir Putin's strength than in Barack Obama's strength. His closeness to Putin is a very scary thing for the country and the fact that the news was dominated for 33 days I think it was by WikiLeaks stories, that had an impact on states that were decided by a knife-edge.”

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Author:E. J. Dionne
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“I think this is a scary thing [hacking] that does have to be taken out of a partisan context. And one of the best pieces of news this morning is a joint statement, Senator [Chuck] Schumer, Senator [Harry] Reid for the Democrats,John McCain and Lindsey Graham from the Republicans, saying we have to get to the bottom of this.”

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Author:E. J. Dionne
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