McKay Coppins > Quotes

“I was accused of being inauthentic. But in reality, that's just who I am," he told me. "I am the authentic person who seems inauthentic.”
― McKay Coppins, Romney: A Reckoning

“You need to understand,” George replied, “that just being right or just being best doesn’t mean that most people will agree with you.”
― McKay Coppins, Romney: A Reckoning

“The point was driven home for him when pizza magnate Herman Cain had spent a not-inconsiderable period of time at the top of the Republican primary polls. Herman Cain! Part of him found the whole thing amusing—but then he pictured actually running for president and somehow trailing a comic-relief candidate like that, and the thought just depressed him.”
― McKay Coppins, The Wilderness: Deep Inside the Republican Party's Combative, Contentious, Chaotic Quest to Take Back the White House

“I think what presidents accomplish by virtue of their personal character is at least as great as what they accomplish by virtue of their policies”
― McKay Coppins, Romney: A Reckoning

“Romney was not an ideologue. He prided himself on this fact. Though he was a Republican, he had no patience for Rush Limbaugh and never read the National Review. If he adhered to any kind of conservatism at all, it was of the small-c variety. He was a believer in fiscal prudence and sober thinking, in well-produced white papers and the Wall Street Journal, in spreadsheets and data and running the numbers one more time. He saw himself, proudly, as a partisan of pragmatism.”
― McKay Coppins, Romney: A Reckoning

“The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity”
― McKay Coppins, Romney: A Reckoning

“Romney had tried to explain his reasoning to this chorus of confidants, but they were still urging him not to shut the door. They contended that even if he didn’t want to launch a formal campaign right now, it would be a mistake to take himself entirely out of the running. They laid out a vivid, detailed scenario in which a fractured Republican Party—divided by a wide field of niche presidential candidates—fails to unite behind a single nominee in 2016, and ends up with a chaotic, historic floor fight at the national convention. Facing a televised descent into disarray, the GOP delegates would naturally turn to Romney—the fully vetted, steady-handed Republican statesman—for salvation. Your party might still need you, Mitt’s loyalists insisted. The country might still need you!”
― McKay Coppins, The Wilderness: Deep Inside the Republican Party's Combative, Contentious, Chaotic Quest to Take Back the White House

“Authoritarianism is like a gargoyle lurking over the cathedral, ready to pounce.”
― McKay Coppins, Romney: A Reckoning

“As it had turned out, assembling a crowd of sign-waving supporters for a Donald Trump campaign rally in Manhattan was a tricky task. A few days before the event, the billionaire’s team was reduced to putting out a casting call through a New York–based agency offering fifty bucks to background actors who were willing to wear Trump shirts, carry Trump posters, and cheer Trump on during his big announcement. (“We”
― McKay Coppins, The Wilderness: Deep Inside the Republican Party's Combative, Contentious, Chaotic Quest to Take Back the White House

“Romney tried to be at peace with not knowing what was on the horizon. He thought about the words of a hymn he sang in church: “Keep thou my feet, I do not ask to see the distant scene, one step enough for me.” In the end, it was an”
― McKay Coppins, Romney: A Reckoning

“The Romney home could be chaotic and loud. Basketballs flew across the living room. Wrestling matches broke out spontaneously. More than once, Ann became so overwhelmed by the boys’ misbehavior that she simply got in her car and drove away.”
― McKay Coppins, Romney: A Reckoning

“developed the motorized iBOT wheelchair and the”
― McKay Coppins, Romney: A Reckoning

“When right-wing rock star Ted Nugent drew national ire for calling President Obama a “subhuman mongrel,” some prominent conservatives like Rick Perry initially came to his defense, while others dodged media questions about the racially charged insult. But after months of “listening sessions” with African American civic leaders, students, and government officials, Rand had come to appreciate how hurtful comments like those could be, even when coming from unserious celebrity provocateurs. One night after Nugent made the comment, Rand emailed Stafford saying he wanted to denounce the remark. Stafford was sympathetic, but he cautioned that, politically, it could cause problems on the right. As a father, doesn’t it offend you? Rand wrote back. Stafford glanced up from his phone at his adopted daughter, who was black, and then at his wife, who had been fuming about Nugent’s comment ever since she heard it. “You’re right,” he told Rand. That night the senator tweeted, “Ted Nugent’s derogatory description of President Obama is offensive and has no place in politics. He should apologize.”
― McKay Coppins, The Wilderness: Deep Inside the Republican Party's Combative, Contentious, Chaotic Quest to Take Back the White House

“He is unquestionably mentally unstable, and he is racist, bigoted, misogynistic, xenophobic, vulgar and prone to violence. There is simply no rational argument that could lead me to vote for someone with those characteristics. I believe your endorsement of him severely diminishes you morally—though probably not politically—and that you must withdraw that support to preserve your integrity and character.”
― McKay Coppins, Romney: A Reckoning

“Great Depression times 100” and hyperinflation on par with the Weimar Republic. Fox News was running stories suggesting that Obama had deployed the Secret Service to monitor the conservative network. And a bizarre conspiracy theory about the president’s birthplace was beginning to gain traction—boosted by an unlikely spokesman. Donald Trump had begun popping up on political talk shows to muse about whether Barack Obama might perhaps be a secret Muslim born in Kenya who’d defrauded American voters to get elected to the presidency. This theory had been kicking around the fringes of U.S. political discourse for years and had already been debunked, but suddenly it—and Trump—were everywhere. On The View: “I want him to show his birth certificate. There’s something on that birth certificate that he doesn’t like.” On Fox News: “He’s spent millions of dollars trying to get away from this issue.… A lot of facts are emerging and I’m starting to wonder myself whether or not he was born in this country.” On The Laura Ingraham Show: “He doesn’t have a birth certificate, or if he does, there’s something on that certificate that is very bad for him. Now, somebody told me—and I have no idea if this is bad for him or not, but perhaps it would be—that where it says ‘religion,’ it might have ‘Muslim.’ ” On the Today show: “If he wasn’t born in this country, which is a real possibility… then he has pulled one of the great cons in the history of politics.” Romney”
― McKay Coppins, Romney: A Reckoning

“They didn’t ask one question about running for governor,” Trump lamented to his yes-men in the SUV after the event, as he slathered on hand sanitizer. “They didn’t care.” There was a tense moment of silence before the driver offered, “They probably think you’re already past that.” Trump liked this theory. “That’s interesting,” he said, raising his voice so that everyone in the car was listening. “Did you hear what he said? He said they think I’m past that. I can’t tell you how many people have said that to me. They say, ‘What are you doing running for governor?’” he said. “It’s a good point.”
― McKay Coppins, The Wilderness: Deep Inside the Republican Party's Combative, Contentious, Chaotic Quest to Take Back the White House

“Romney, of all people, knew the power of such rationalizations. But he also knew the pandering came with a cost. The elected leaders of his party had forgotten how to say no to their base. They’d forgotten how to do unpopular things simply because they were right. That muscle had atrophied—and Romney believed voters would notice sooner or later.”
― McKay Coppins, Romney: A Reckoning