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American Life Quotes

Browse 209 quotes about American Life.

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American Life Quotes

“I don't like to lose, and that isn't so much because it is just a football game, but because defeat means the failure to reach your objective. I don't want a football player who doesn't take defeat to heart, who laughs it off with the thought, "Oh, well, there's another Saturday." The trouble in American life today, in business as well as in sports, is that too many people are afraid of competition. The result is that in some circles people have come to sneer at success if it costs hard work and training and sacrifice.”

PeopleIfsWantWellsHeartMeanHardTodayGamesSportsLosesResultsBusinessLaughingPlayerTroubleSacrificeFootballHard WorkFailureCostTrainingCompetitionDefeatCirclesObjectivesSaturdayFootball PlayerAmerican LifeFootball GameOh WellSneer
Author:Knute Rockne
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“The politics of that year [2004] are old now, but the problem remains the same, the real culture clash of American life. It's between the essence of fundamentalism - paternalism, authority, and charity - and the messy imperatives of democracy, "the din of the vox populi" once derided by Abram Vereide. It's the difference between false unity, preached from above, and real solidarity, pledged between brothers and sisters - the kinds who are always bickering.”

YearsKindRealProblemCultureDifferencesDemocracyBrotherAuthorityEthicsEssenceRemainsUnityCharitySolidarityFundamentalismCitizenshipBrothers And SistersImperativesMessyClashAmerican LifeBickeringAbramPaternalismVox Populi
Author:Jeff Sharlet
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“Senator Allen has long been a leader on competitiveness issues in the Senate and as governor of Virginia. His announcement of the Competitiveness Caucus comes as great news to the nation's manufacturers. We support every item on this agenda and will work with Senator Allen and others to make it a reality. The time has come for Congress to recognize the vital role manufacturing plays in American life and do what it can to strengthen our ability to compete in the global marketplace.”

LongPlayRealityNationsAbilityLeaderRolesSupportIssuesNewsCongressAgendasSenateGovernorsSenatorsItemsMarketplaceManufacturingVirginiaAmerican LifeCompetitivenessAnnouncementsCaucusGreat News
Author:John Engler
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“If you read the biographies of people who have written good books, you often see the point where they suddenly come into themselves, and those weeks in the spring of 1997 were when I came into myself as a writer. They feel like some of the best weeks of writing I’ll ever have. The discovery that I could write better about something as trivial as an ordinary family dinner than I could about the exploding prison population of the United States, and the corporatization of American life, and all the other things I’d been trying to do, was a real revelation.”

PeopleIfsFeelsWritingTryingBookRealStatesUnitedUnited StatesWrittenWeekSpringOrdinaryDiscoveryPrisonPopulationDinnerRevelationsBiographiesGood BookAmerican LifeExplodingFamily DinnerPrison Population
Author:Jonathan Franzen
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“In the decade of the 1980s, a massive and comprehensive study of religion in American life was undertaken by the Gallup organization. The results of the study were as terrifying as they were revealing. Americans, even evangelical Americans, are woefully ignorant of the content of Scripture and even more ignorant of the history of Christianity and classical Christian theology.”

ChristianResultsChristianityStudyOrganizationDecadesScriptureTheologyIgnorantMassiveRevealingComprehensiveEvangelicalAmerican LifeChristian Theology
Book:Essential Truths of the Christian Faith
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“One of the manifestations of depression for me is that I lose my will. And I thereby lose my ability to focus. I don't think I'll ever have the day-to-day consistency in my performance that something like This American Life has. If I'm not depressed and I'm on and I can focus and I can think through something hard and without interruption and without existential emptiness that comes from depression, that gives me - not mania. But I exalt. I exalt in not being depressed.”

IfsThinkingGivingI CanHardLosesAbilityFocusPerformancesGive MeManifestationEmptinessExistentialConsistencyDay To DayAmerican LifeInterruptionsManiaBeing Depressed
Author:Rachel Maddow
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“Buffett's uncommon urge to chronicle made him a unique character in American life, not only a great capitalist but the Great Explainer of American capitalism. He taught a generation how to think about business, and he showed that securities were not just tokens like the Monopoly flatiron, and that investing need not be a game of chance. It was also a logical, commonsensical enterprise, like the tangible businesses beneath. He stripped Wall Street of its mystery and rejoined it to Main Street -- a mythical or disappearing place, perhaps, but one that is comprehensible to the ordinary American.”

ThinkingNeedsMadeCharacterGamesChanceGenerationsMysteryStreetsSecurityTaughtWallUniqueOrdinaryCapitalismInvestingDisappearEnterpriseUrgesLogicalCapitalistMonopolyTangibleUncommonAmerican LifeTokensChroniclesBuffettMain StreetAmerican Capitalism
Book:Buffett: The Making of an American Capitalist
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“When I left the theater… I was thinking that I’d seen a classic of American dance. It confers a mythic dimension on ordinary aspects of our daily lives – it’s unfaked folk art. The dancers, crashing wave upon wave into those falls, have a happy insane spirit that recalls a unique moment in American life – the time we did the school play or we were ready to drown at a swimming meet. The last time most of us were happy in that way.”

ThinkingWayArtPlayMomentsSchoolLastsSpiritFallLeftReadyUniqueOrdinaryAspectTheaterFolksWaveInsaneClassicDimensionsDancerDaily LifeSwimmingRecallsLast TimeAmerican LifeSchool PlaysFolk ArtCrashing Waves
Author:Arlene Croce
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“The strongest argument for the un-materialistic character of American life is the fact that we tolerate conditions that are, from a materialistic point of view, intolerable. ... No nation with any sense of material well-being would endure the food we eat, the cramped apartments we live in, the noise, the traffic, the crowded subways and buses. American life, in large cities, at any rate, is a perpetual assault on the senses and the nerves.”

LifeCharacterLife IsViewsCitiesConditionsBearsArgumentRatePoint Of ViewSensesStrongestNervesPerpetualTolerateApartmentAssaultCrowdedMaterialisticSubwayAmerican LifeAsceticismLarge Cities
Author:Mary McCarthy
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“Never before has the seductive market way of life held such sway in nearly every sphere of American life. This marketing way of life promotes addictions to stimulation and obsessions with comfort and convenience ... centered primarily around bodily pleasures and status rankings. ... The common denominator is a rugged and ragged individualism and rapacious hedonism in quest of a perennial "high" in body and mind.”

WayMindBodyBlackPleasureCommonComfortAddictionMarketingObsessionSpheresIndividualismQuestsMind And BodyBlack HistoryConvenienceSeductiveAmerican LifeStimulationCommon DenominatorRuggedRankingRaggedHedonism
Author:Cornel West
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“The moral and social aspiration proper to American life is, of course, the aspiration vaguely described by the word democratic; and the actual achievement of the American nation points towards an adequate and fruitful definition of the democratic ideal.”

Life IsCoursesLiteratureNationsSocialMoralAchievementIdealsDemocraticDefinitionsAspirationAdequateAmerican LifeSwaggerSwagDemocratic Ideals
Book:The Promise of American Life
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“To the European immigrant - that is, to the aliens who have been converted into Americans by the advantages of American life - the Promise of America has consisted largely in the opportunity which it offered of economic independence and prosperity.”

Has BeensAmericaLiteratureOpportunityEconomicPromiseAdvantageIndependenceProsperityAliensImmigrantsAmerican LifeConvertingEconomic Independence
Book:The Promise of American Life
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“Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life.”

PerfectLove YouAll ThingsIndianNativeNative AmericanFear Of DeathRespecting OthersValorAmerican IndianAmerican LifeNative American WisdomGoing HomeGreat SpiritNative AmericaNative American IndianGreat Native AmericanNative American EarthIndian WisdomNative WisdomAmerican SpiritLove Your LifeNative American Indian InspirationalNative American SpiritualNative American DreamDeath PoemsSpiritual IndianIndian TribesAmerican Eagle
Author:Tecumseh
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“Bean-counting government bureaucrats are free to take race, ethnicity and gender into account when doling out public funds to non-white-male contractors. But God help law enforcement officers, air marshals and border agents who try to use those same factors to combat terrorism and protect American lives.”

TryingHelpingUseGovernmentLawPoliticsWhiteRaceAirProtectAccountsMalesGenderTerrorismFactorsAgentsBordersFundCombatOfficersLaw EnforcementEnforcementCountingBeansBureaucratsEthnicityAmerican LifeGod HelpContractorRace Ethnicity
Author:Michelle Malkin
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“I think it's a very legitimate aspect of American life to criticize and to disagree and to debate. But I want to say I think it's a lie to say that the president lied to the American people. I sat on the Robb-Silverman Commission. I saw many, many analysts that came before that committee. I asked every one of them-I said, 'Did-were you ever pressured politically or any other way to change your analysis of the situation as you saw?' Every one of them said no.”

PeopleThinkingWayWantSaidLyingPoliticsPresidentSituationSawsAspectDebateAnalysisSatCriticizeDisagreeCommitteesLiedAmerican LifeAnalystsPressured
Author:John McCain
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“In our methodical American life, we still recognize some magic in summer. Most persons at least resign themselves to being decently happy in June. They accept June. They compliment its weather. They complain of the earlier months as cold, and so spend them in the city; and they complain of the later months as hot, and so refrigerate themselves on some barren sea-coast. God offers us yearly a necklace of twelve pearls; most men choose the fairest, label it June, and cast the rest away.”

MenPersonsStillsCitiesAcceptingMagicSeaMonthsColdOffersSummerHotCastsComplainingWeatherLabelsComplimentTwelveCoastPearlsJuneBarrenAmerican LifeNecklacesMethodical
Book:Outdoor Studies, Poems
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