“Those who have prospered and profited from life's lottery have a moral obligation to share their good fortune.” Quote by Dick Gephardt
“Sometimes I'll be fifty, sixty pages into something and I'll still be calling a character "X." I don't have a very clear idea of who the characters are until they start talking. Then I start to love them. By the time I finish the book, I love them so much that I want to stay with them. I don't want to leave them ever.” WantStillsBookIdeasSometimesCharacterTalkingClearCallingPagesFiftySixty Author:Joan Didion
“I start a book and I want to make it perfect, want it to turn every color, want it to be the world. Ten pages in, I've already blown it, limited it, made it less, marred it. That's very discouraging. I hate the book at that point. After a while I arrive at an accommodation: Well, it's not the ideal, it's not the perfect object I wanted to make, but maybeif I go ahead and finish it anywayI can get it right next time. Maybe I can have another chance.” IfsWorldWantWellsMadeI CanBookWantedHateTurnsNextChancePerfectObjectsColorTenPagesIdealsI HateMade ItNext TimeDiscouragingAnother ChanceAccommodations Author:Joan Didion
“To believe in'the greater good' isto operate, necessarily, in a certain ethical suspension.” BelieveCertainGreaterEthicalGreater GoodSuspension Author:Joan Didion
“Aspiring dictators sometimes win elections, and elected leaders sometimes govern badly and threaten their neighbors.History demonstrates that democracy usually follows good governance, not the reverse.” SometimesWinningLeaderDemocracyElectionNeighborDictatorReverseGovernanceGood GovernanceElected Leaders Author:Rudy Giuliani
“The sky's the limit for all Americans if we have the right kind of leadership.” IfsKindSkyLimitsSky's The Limit Author:Rudy Giuliani
“In tracking down and eliminating terrorists, we need to change our metaphor from a "war on terror" - exactly what, pray tell, is that? - to the mind-set of Interpol tracking down master criminals through intense global cooperation among nations, or the FBI stalking the Mafia, or local police determined to quell street gangs without leveling the entire neighborhood in the process.” NeedsMindWarNationsProcessStreetsMastersPrayingPoliceDown AndMetaphorTerrorDeterminedCriminalsTerroristIntenseLocalsNeighborhoodCooperationGangMafiaFbiStalkingWar On TerrorNeed A ChangeEliminatingMind SetTracking Author:Bill Moyers
“Reagan's story of freedom superficially alludes to the Founding Fathers, but its substance comes from the Gilded Age, devised by apologists for the robber barons. It is posed abstractly as the freedom of the individual from government control a Jeffersonian ideal at the roots of our Bill of Rights, to be sure. But what it meant in politics a century later, and still means today, is the freedom to accumulate wealth without social or democratic responsibilities and license to buy the political system right out from everyone else.” MeanStillsStoriesGovernmentAgeTodayPoliticalFatherIndividualSocialWealthResponsibilityRightsCenturyIdealsRootsBillsDemocraticSubstanceFoundingLicensePolitical SystemsBill Of RightsRobbersGildedGilded AgeRobber Baron Author:Bill Moyers
“In those days [1955], affirmative action was for whites only. I might still be working for the grocery store in the small Texas town where I grew up were it not for affirmative action for Southern white boys.” StillsMightActionWhiteBoysGrewGrew UpTownsStoresTexasSouthernGroceriesAffirmative ActionAffirmativeGrocery Stores Author:Bill Moyers