97 quotes found
"It's about time law enforcement got as organized as organized crime."
"We look upon authority too often and focus over and over again, for thirty or forty or fifty years, as if there is something wrong with authority. We see only the oppressive side of authority. Maybe it comes out of our history and our background. What we don't see is that freedom is not a concept in which people can do anything they want, be anything they can be. Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do."
"I think the president has to be treated like everyone else. 'Cause I think under the criminal law everybody should be treated the same. I know there are people who would say that the president should be treated stricter. We used to have an era in which the president was treated much more leniently. But I think the right answer is: the president should be treated the same; as far as the criminal law is concerned the president is a citizen."
"Most of Clinton's policies are very similar to most of mine."
"I’m pro-choice. I’m pro-gay rights."
"No, I have not supported that, and I don’t see my position on that changing."
"The number of casualties will be more than any of us can bear ultimately. And I don't think we want to speculate on the number of casualties. The effort now has to be to save as many people as possible."
"The attacks of September 11 were intended to break our spirit, instead we have emerged stronger and more unified. We feel renewed devotion to the principles of political, economic and religious freedom, the rule of law and respect for human life. We are more determined than ever to live our lives in freedom"
"I don’t need Michael Moore to tell me about September 11."
"Leaders must be optimists. Their vision was beyond the present and set on a future of real peace and true freedom."
"In choosing a president, we really don't choose a Republican or Democrat, a conservative or liberal. We choose a leader."
"There are many qualities that make a great leader but having strong beliefs, being able to stick with them through popular and unpopular times, is the most important characteristic of a great leader."
"No matter how you try to blame it on the president, the actual responsibility for it really would be for the troops that were there. Did they search carefully enough?"
"When you confront a problem, you begin to solve it."
"The idea of trying to cast blame on President Clinton is just wrong for many, many reasons, not the least of which is I don't think he deserves it."
"It would be very dangerous to use the military option [against Iran]. It would not be a good thing. But it would be much more dangerous and much worse if they had nuclear weapons."
"Iraq may get better; Iraq may get worse. We may be successful in Iraq; we may not be. I don’t know the answer to that. That’s in the hands of other people. But what we do know for sure is the terrorists are going to be at war with us a year, a year and a half from now."
"After the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and other terrorist incidents, "The United States government, then President Clinton, did not respond. Bin Laden declared war on us. We didn't hear it."
"I was at ground zero as often, if not more, than most of the workers. I was there working with them. I was there guiding things. I was there bringing people there. But I was exposed to exactly the same things they were exposed to. So in that sense, I'm one of them."
"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."
"...the sky's the limit for all Americans if we have the right kind of leadership."
"We can determine America's future. After all, that's what an election is all about. So let's decide for optimism, not pessimism; for hope, not despair; for strength, not weakness; for victory, not defeat."
"Change is not a destination as hope is not a strategy."
"We had no domestic attacks under Bush. We’ve had one under Obama."
"I do not believe, and I know this is a horrible thing to say, but I do not believe that the president loves America. He doesn't love you. And he doesn't love me. He wasn't brought up the way you were brought up and I was brought up through love of this country."
"Don’t you think a man who has this kind of economic genius is a lot better for the United States than a woman, and the only thing she’s ever produced is a lot of work for the FBI checking out her e-mails."
"Truth isn't truth."
"Shut up, moron, shut up, shut up."
"China manufactured the virus and let it out, and they deliberately spread it around the world."
"The Borat video is a complete fabrication. I was tucking in my shirt after taking off the recording equipment. At no time before, during, or after the interview was I ever inappropriate."
"Republican Legislature let down America. I’m ashamed of them. They completely misled the President and me."
"To all those patriots challenging the fraudulent election ...You are on the right side of the law and history."
"Over the next 10 days, we get to see the machines that are crooked, the ballots that are fraudulent. If we're wrong, we will be made fools of, but if we're right a lot of them will go to jail. Let's have trial by combat."
"Rudy Giuliani — there's only three things he mentions in a sentence: a noun, a verb, and 9/11."
"He is a small man in search of a balcony."
"Rudy Giuliani is a problem solver with common sense leadership who made a tremendous and positive difference as Mayor of New York, impacting peoples’ lives for the better."
"This is the accumulation of sixty years of hard work. Many of these watches hold great sentimental value, and he’s being forced to turn all these over under court order"
"Frankly, you have to understand the fact that Rudy Giuliani was a McGovern Democrat, he was endorsed by the Liberal Party when he ran for Mayor. In his heart, he's a Democrat. He's paraded all over this country with Bill Clinton and, in fact, he's very comfortable with Mario Cuomo. But what Rudy Giuliani wants is to be bailed out in the city, in the mess he's in, and everybody understands very clearly in politics that they struck a deal, that Mario's going to continue to be the big spender, save Rudy the options of raising taxes by pouring money statewide into the City of New York and bailing it out."
"And I just want to say one other thing about Mayor Giuliani: As this began, and if you were like me, and in many respects, God, I hope you're not. But in this one small measure, if you're like me, and you're watching and you're confused and depressed and irritated and angry and full of grief, and you don't know how to behave and you're not sure what to do and you don't really... because we've never been through this before... all you had to do at any moment was watch the Mayor. Watch how this guy behaved. Watch how this guy conducted himself. Watch what this guy did. Listen to what this guy said. Rudolph Giuliani is the personification of courage."
"He's basically Goro in a suit."
"And I wanted to say to the mayor of New York all our concern, our admiration for what has been done after this drama, with such an efficiency, very full of clever and heart. I told him that in the French press, when they mention the mayor of New York, they say "mayor hero" (ph), which is a French expression equivalent to "Rudy the Rock"."
"He's the man of the hour, a man whose extraordinary grace under pressure in the days since this devastating attack has led him to be called America's mayor. He's the mayor of New York City, ladies and gentlemen, Rudy Giuliani."
"Giuliani's performance ensures that he will be remembered as the greatest mayor in the city's history."
"The eight years he spent terrorizing the poor, the homeless, the artistic community, the queer community, the minority communities in New York City should not be forgotten."
"Giuliani symbolizes the civic contributions that led to New York becoming one of the safest cities in the world, a city where people need no longer fear violence. [...] I believe that he has, through his political efforts, saved more human lives than most people alive today."
"As Mayor of New York City, Rudy Giuliani showed how exercising fiscal discipline, including tax cuts, lowers deficits, spurs economic growth, and increases revenue. It is time the rest of the country benefit from a true fiscal conservative leader who gets real results."
"Rudy Giuliani is a true American hero, and we know this because he does all the things we expect of heroes these days -- like make $16 million a year, and lobby for Hugo Chávez and Rupert Murdoch, and promote wars without ever having served in the military, and hire a lawyer to call his second wife a "stuck pig," and organize absurd, grandstanding pogroms against minor foreign artists, and generally drift through life being a shameless opportunist with an outsize ego who doesn't even bother to conceal the fact that he's had a hard-on for the presidency since he was in diapers. In the media age, we can't have a hero humble enough to actually be one; what is needed is a tireless scoundrel, a cad willing to pose all day long for photos, who'll accept $100,000 to talk about heroism for an hour, who has the balls to take a $2.7 million advance to write a book about himself called Leadership. That's Rudy Giuliani. Our hero. And a perfect choice to uphold the legacy of George W. Bush."
"Rudy Giuliani has shown that he is a true leader. He can and will win the nomination and the presidency. He is America's mayor, and during a period of time of great stress for this country he showed tremendous leadership."
"Well, among other things, it seems Rudy's a bit of a fibber. Says one thing one, then denies it a few hours later, apparently not familiar with the concept of audio and video recordings."
"[He] didn't bring us together, our pain brought us together... We would have come together if Bozo was the mayor."
"Middlebury College has made the decision to revoke the honorary degree it presented to the presidential attorney Rudolph Giuliani in 2005, and has communicated this to Mr. Giuliani's office"
"Lay down with dogs. Wake up with fleas and without $20,000 a day"
"In 1990, a Boston police expert, Bill Bratton, was appointed head of New York's subway police and introduced the 'zero tolerance' policy of arresting and prosecuting even in minor cases. This worked so well that in 1993, when the federal prosecutor Rudolph Giuliani was elected mayor of New York, he gave Bratton the opportunity to apply the energy to the city as a whole, and the results were impressive. In 1993-95, violent and property crimes dropped 26 percent in New York, murders by teenagers dropped 28 percent, car theft 46 percent, robbery 41 percent, and murder 49 percent. New York, with 3 percent of the population, accounted for one-third of the fall in reported crimes in three years. In 1996 the city reported fewer murders than at any time since 1968. But, though more effective policing helped, abetted by the underlying demographic factors, such as a rise in the average age of the population, most studies agreed that a radical improvement in the level of crime in America would depend on the return to a more religious or moralistic culture. Historians have always noted that organized religion had proved the best form of social control in Western societies."
"I hope people who should have known better then, understand now that Giuliani succeeding Dinkins was an outcome of similar forces that led to Trump succeeding Obama."
"I'm afraid it will be on my gravestone: 'Rudy Giuliani. He lied for Trump.' Somehow, I don't think that will be it. But, if it is, so what do I care? I’ll be dead."
"It is somewhat unfortunate that there is a problem in Ireland and I hope the English do get out of Ireland."
"I've said it before and I'll say it again, England get out of Ireland."
"You don't have to be born in New York City to be a New Yorker. You have to live here for six months. And if at the end of the six months you walk faster, you talk faster, you think faster, you're a New Yorker."
"You ask Israel to cease building settlements on the West Bank, which are intended not only to house Israelis, but to provide a defense bulwark when the Islamist armies of the surrounding states, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria – Assad or his opponents – and Iraq, again try militarily to crush Israel. Will Britain come to Israel's aid? I recall when in one of those wars, Britain declined to deliver to Israel tanks it had purchased from your country. Britain under Chamberlain participated in the Munich sellout of Czechoslovakia. What you and your European colleagues are doing now is repeating the sellout, this time of Israel. The Czech Republic, mindful of what happened to it, is the only European country to vote no to Palestinian statehood. When one of your predecessors told the world that he offered "peace in our time," he wrote himself into history as a disgrace. How will history on this issue recall you? Why would you expect Israel to cooperate in its intended lynching?"
"It is not possible to remake the world. You can fix parts, but you can't remake the world."
"Yet how do you govern in a city where everyone thinks he or she is the best and can do it better than you? You do it by conveying that you are giving everything you have, and you demonstrate that what you are doing is what they would be doing if they were in your place. You become their hand on the wheel of government. People want to touch you, praise you, harangue you, love you and hate you. And as Mayor, you must be able to accept it all and at the same time not become overwhelmed by the praise or overcome by the abuse."
"I have as my shield ever before me that public service is the noblest of professions if it is done honestly and done well. I know that in the private sector, no matter how much money you make (and it's nice to make money) you can't have the sense of satisfaction that comes at the highest levels of government from helping improve the lives of millions of people. I know that every Mayor of New York since Fiorella LaGuardia has been measured by the public and has measured himself against the image of the Little Flower. He has created the standard. I am hopeful that at the end of my Mayoral career, whether that be another six or ten years, I will have left such a positive mark. I believe that I will, but only the historians will be able to make that judgement."
"I am Mayor of a city that has more Jews than live in Jerusalem, more Italians than live in Rome, more Irish than live in Dublin, more blacks than live in Nairobi and more Puerto Ricans than live in San Juan. It is a tremendous responsibility, but there is no other job in the world that compares with it. Every day is new. Every day is dangerous. Every day is filled with excitement. Every day has the possibility of accomplishing some major success that will impact positively on the lives of the citizens of the City of New York. Every day I am both humbled and made even more proud than the day before."
"I remember walking down Eighth Street one Friday morning, and being stopped by one of my constituents, an elderly lady who approached me, wanting to talk. "How'm I doing?" I said, in what was becoming the signature greeting of my political career. "Congressman," she said, "you're doing just terrible. How could you support those yellow-bellies? My grandson is in Vietnam, and here you are supporting those yellow-bellies in Canada." "Ma'am," I said, as gently as I could manage. "I don't want to try and persuade you, but let me tell you my position. I think the war is wrong. I think that ultimately we have to bring our boys home. We've ruined too many lives, the draft dodgers' and the deserters' among them. It is time to heal. Now, I understand you see things differently, and I hope your grandson is okay, but this is my position. I hope you'll ultimately agree with me, but it's not necessary that you do. We will never agree on everything." Then I added, "But other than that, how else am I doing?" "Other than that, you're doing wonderful," she said, and we both laughed."
"Incidentally, my "How'm I doing?" phrase grew out of my first term as a Congressman. I used to come home to New York every Friday when Congress was not in session, and hand out literature at the twenty-five major subway and bus stops in my district. Every Friday morning, I'd be at one of them. I wanted to stay in touch with my constituents and give them the opportunity to talk to me, so I did not miss a week. Typically, I would hand out a reprint of some statement I had made in Congress that week and include a little box telling people to write to express their opinion and help me to implement my suggestions. I asked them to send me copies of their letters, and that's how I communicated with them. Hundreds of my statements were copied in letters in the course of a week, as a direct result of my bus and subway stops; the originals were sent to the President, or his Cabinet members, among others. Of course, my constituents were not always happy to see me, particularly at seven o'clock in the morning when they were running to catch the subway. They had other things on their minds than communicating with their Congressman. Most of them were in such a hurry that they probably saw me as an impediment. Perhaps they thought I was crazy; after all, it wasn't an election year- what the hell did I think I was doing? I was trying to get attention, but it wasn't easy. When I first started, I would say, "Good morning," and people would rush by me, into the subway. A few would say, "Good morning," but that was about it. I don't think they were being rude, just indifferent, distracted. Then one morning, just to vary the routine a little, I said, "I'm Ed Koch, your Congressman. How'm I doing?" And people responded. They actually stopped. Sometimes they told me I was doing lousy, but they always stopped. And they talked to me, and I listened."
"Right away, I knew I was onto something, so I kept at it. I started to use the phrase in my newsletters and press releases. When I campaigned for reelection, I used it in my speeches, and everywhere else it seemed appropriate. "How'm I doing?" became associated with me, as it still is to this day. Years later, after I became mayor, the writer Ken Auletta, among others, condemned me for my slogan. There were a lot of people who used to criticize me for using it as often as I did, but for some reason Auletta's derision has stayed with me. He wrote that instead of saying, "How am I doing?" I should be saying, "How are we doing?" I thought to myself, You dope. Do you think anyone could stand at a subway stop at seven in the morning saying, "How are we doing?" and expect an kind of response. That's the way a teacher talks to her children: "How are we doing today?" It's patronizing. Worse, it sounds foolish. Corporations pay millions of dollars for slogans and logos, and most times people don't remember them. And it didn't cost a nickel. I wasn't about to give up a good thing."
"There has been, and will always be, a special relationship between me and the people of New York city. It's really quite extraordinary. I cherish this relationship dearly, and at the same time, I am humbled by it. It transcends politics. I've devoted my life to the city, and if the response to this brief hospitalization is any indication, the devotion has been returned. I hope this relationship never changes, although I suspect it will, over time. My plan is to keep it going for as long as I can, because I've only just started on this third career of mine. If it is to be my last act, then I'd like it to be a long one, and a productive one, and I'd like to work up until the last moment. For now, though, I'm still here, and I'm still whole, and I've got a lot left to do."
"Death penalty: The death penalty will not solve the problem of crime, but it is more than merely symbolic. There are some people who commit murder that so subvert society that they deserve nothing less than a death sentence. I believe, as does the Supreme Court, that some people will be deterred by it."
"The people have spoken ... and they must be punished."
"I'm the sort of person who will never get ulcers. Why? Because I say exactly what I think. I'm the sort of person who might give other people ulcers."
"If you agree with me on nine out of 12 issues, vote for me. If you agree with me on 12 out of 12 issues, see a psychiatrist."
"On a dusty wall of McSorley's Old Ale House, the oldest Irish tavern in New York City, hangs an autographed portrait of the late New York Mayor Ed Koch. Koch inscribed a pro-IRA slogan below his portrait and above his signature, an apparent appeal to the tavern's Irish Catholic owners: "England out of Ireland." Koch was, of course, one of the Democratic Party's most vocal supporters of Israel's settlement enterprise. He smeared critics of the occupation of Palestine as "terrorist supporter[s]." The irony of his inscription can hardly be overstated."
"The hurt in my heart and the agony in my soul were of such intensity that when I was home and first got the news of a national homosexual bill similar to the one in Dade County, all I could do was cry. This bill, HR2998, would have the effect of making it mandatory nationwide to hire known practicing homosexuals in public schools and in other areas. With all the thousands of other letters I received from groups all over the country dealing with pornography, abortion, TV violence, ERA, and various other things, all I could do was weep for America. There are no words in the English language strong enough to describe the grief I felt."
"The second liberal gripe against Carter is that he lost to Reagan. As the saying went, Carter was defeated by the three Ks — Khomeini, Kennedy and Koch. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini’s Iranian revolution led to the hostage crisis that was a millstone round Carter’s neck. After 444 days in captivity, the US hostages were released a few minutes after Carter left office. It has not been proved that Reagan struck a back channel deal with Khomeini’s government to keep the hostages until after the 1980 election. But the evidence is very strong. Carter believes that William Casey, Reagan’s campaign manager, did strike a bargain. Such an unnatural Rolodex would also explain Reagan’s Iran-Contra shenanigans a few years later. Ted Kennedy’s primary challenge also damaged Carter. Though Kennedy infamously could not explain why he wanted to be president, Carter had his own theory: Kennedy saw it as his birthright. The gap between the rural Georgian farmer who grew up without shoes and the Boston aristocrat is a faultline that still hobbles the Democratic party. Biden is on Carter’s side of it. Ed Koch was New York’s Democratic mayor who thought Carter was biased against Israel. Carter’s Camp David deal neutralised Egypt — Israel’s most potent enemy — and thus did more for Israel’s security than any US president since. No good deed goes unpunished. Carter was the only Democratic president to get less than half of the Jewish vote. Paul Volcker’s last name does not start with a K. However, the then chair of the US Federal Reserve is probably the largest contributor to Carter’s defeat. With interest rates at 20 per cent, Carter stood little chance at the ballot box. It is worth noting that Carter picked Volcker in full knowledge of his anti-inflation credentials. On that, as so much else, Carter did the right thing but got no credit. The left hated him for it. The right pretended it was Reagan’s doing. Much the same can be said of how America won the cold war. The moral of Carter’s story is that virtue must be its own reward. History is a biased judge."
"[Response when asked by a reporter if his ‘relationship with the governor is deteriorating'] No, I think it’s pretty much consistent."
"My father was a picture of courage in terms of his war service and strength, and yet in his decline, I learned primarily negative lessons. I learned what not to do. [about his father] I have a real respect, and a real anger and sadness at the same time. I don’t think I’ve ever been able to do the math on exactly what it all means."
"Look, the New Democrat approach, from my point of view, didn't work. That governing approach didn't stop the progression that led us to a thoroughly Republican House and now Senate, and a national debate that doesn't even address the real issues. The economic crisis of today — the only parallel is the Great Depression. That's just a fact. The difference is, there's no light at the end of the tunnel now."
"Tonight we took another big step toward a fairer city for all, tonight another ratification of all that we’ve been doing together and it’s going to give us the fuel to go farther."
"If you could remove News Corp from the last 25 years of American history, we would be in an entirely different place."
"My message to the Jewish community, and all communities, is this simple: the time for warnings has passed. I have instructed the NYPD to proceed immediately to summons or even arrest those who gather in large groups. This is about stopping this disease and saving lives. Period."
"Anthony Huber and Joseph Rosenbaum are victims. They should be alive today. The only reason they’re not is because a violent, dangerous man chose to take a gun across state lines and start shooting people. To call this a miscarriage of justice is an understatement."
"Governor Cuomo has complete discretion to be able to issue mass clemencies for the prisons. We know that de Blasio, the mayor, has the power to be able to release hundreds and thousands of people from Rikers Island and other jails. And so we really want them to be able to do that. There’s lots of pressure and demands that have been issued by local groups."
"I haven't committed a crime. What I did was fail to comply with the law."
"You can be anything you want to be. You can be a street sweeper, if you want. Just be the best blasted street sweeper you can be . . . And, you know you can be mayor."
"We borrowed money, it helped us with bonds and what not, and the Federal Government backed it, but it was a guarantee, it was not a grant. And we not only paid it off, but we paid it off ahead of time."
"So it's a mistake for someone to think that they bailed New York out. They did assist us, for which we are grateful, but it's a mistake to say we bailed New York out by giving them a grant of money to help those poor people who throw it away on welfare."
"The art and culture that is New York, communications, finance, all these things help make up New York. The rest of the country should be happy that we are what we are."
"Today, certain people file for bankruptcy, businesses and individuals, and it no longer has the stigma it once had. Now it's almost considered wise, a way to regroup and come back again."
"Lying is at the root of our training. At the academy, recruits are told that they should not see black or brown people as different, but we all do. We all know that the majority of people arrested for predatory crimes are African-American. We didn't create that scenario, but we have to police in that scenario. So we need to be honest and talk about it."
"All my haters become my waiters when I sit down at the table of success."
"Turn your haters into your waiters and give them a 15 percent tip."
"It blows my mind how much we have not embraced technology, and part of that is because many of our electeds are afraid. Anything technology they think, ‘Oh it’s a boogeyman. It’s Big Brother watching you,’...No, Big Brother is protecting you."
"Don’t tell me about no separation of church and state. State is the body. Church is the heart. You take the heart out of the body, the body dies."
"I am mayor because God gave me the authority to be mayor, and he placed in the hearts of the voters to give me that authority. Sometimes we miss how God operates, but I am clear when I receive my blessings from God."
"The gentleman [Mr. Taber] from New York says [agricultural research] is all foolish. Yes; it was foolish when Burbank was experimenting with wild cactus. It was foolish when the Wright boys went down to Kitty Hawk and had a contraption there that they were going to fly like birds. It was foolish when Robert Fulton tried to put a boiler into a sail boat and steam it up the Hudson. It was foolish when one of my ancestors thought the world was round and discovered this country so that the gentleman from New York could become a Congressman. ... Do not seek to stop progress; do not seek to put the hand of politics on these scientific men who are doing a great work. As the gentleman from Texas points out, it is not the discharge of these particular employees that is at stake, it is all the work of investigation, of research, of experimentation that has been going on for years that will be stopped and lost."
"I am firmly convinced that the conduct of the Irish in America has been strongly influential in winning for those at home that moral support which comes from the sympathy of strangers to the blood, and which is in itself almost as valuable as the material assistance which has been so lavishly bestowed."