Presidents Quotes

“The science of government it is my duty to study, more than all other sciences; the arts of legislation and administration and negotiation ought to take the place of, indeed exclude, in a manner, all other arts. I must study politics and war, that our sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. Our sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history and naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry and porcelain.”
― John Adams, Letters of John Adams, Addressed to His Wife

“I never did give them hell. I just told the truth, and they thought it was hell.”
― Harry S. Truman

“Presidents are selected, not elected.”
― Franklin Delano Roosevelt

“Most of the mess that is called history comes about because kings and presidents cannot be satisfied with a nice chicken and a good loaf of bread.”
― Jennifer Donnelly, Revolution

“Next time I tell you someone from Texas should not be president of the United States, please pay attention."

[Shrub Flubs His Dub, The Nation, June 18, 2001]”
― Molly Ivins

“Trump’s America is not America: not today’s or tomorrow’s, but yesterday’s.

Trump’s America is brutal, perverse, regressive, insular and afraid. There is no hope in it; there is no light in it. It is a vast expanse of darkness and desolation.

And that is a vision of America that most of the people in this country cannot and will not abide.”
― Charles M. Blow

“George W. Bush is the worst President
in all of American history.”
― Helen Thomas

“The Nazis are not justified by saying,

Don't you know that there is more than just the issue of the Jews? The issues are more complex than that! What of the poor in this country, who cannot afford housing? What about the sick and malnourished? Don't you care about these people? Don't you claim to be a follower of Jesus?!

Supporting a murderous political agenda with such an argument is tragic!

And what do we know about Obama? He is the single most anti-life proponent that has ever run for the office of president.”
― Joseph Bayly

“Any American who is prepared to run for president should automatically, by definition, be disqualified from ever doing so.”
― Gore Vidal

“Just as he did during the Slavery at Monticello tour, David did not mince words. "There’s a chapter in Notes on the State of Virginia,” he said to the five of us, standing in front of the east wing of Jefferson’s manor, “that has some of the most racist things you might ever read, written by anyone, anywhere, anytime, in it. So sometimes I stop and ask myself, 'If Gettysburg had gone the wrong way, would people be quoting the Declaration of Independence or Notes on the State of Virginia?' It’s the same guy writing.”
― Clint Smith, How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America

“Sensible and responsible women do not want to vote. The relative positions to be assumed by man and woman in the working out of our civilization were assigned long ago by a higher intelligence than ours.”
― Grover Cleveland

“My job is to find the politicians and the presidents and the pompous people who are telling other people how to live, powerful, visible creatures and ... go at them.”
― Craig Ferguson

“The president is the high priest of what sociologist Robert Bellah calls the 'American civil religion.' The president must invoke the name of God (though not Jesus), glorify America's heroes and history,quote its sacred texts (the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution), and perform the transubstantiation of pluribus unum.”
― Jonathan Haidt

“Our president looks like a Christmas ham and talks like Chucky. We're America, bitch.”
― Salman Rushdie, Quichotte

“During the 1992 election I concluded as early as my first visit to New Hampshire that Bill Clinton was hateful in his behavior to women, pathological as a liar, and deeply suspect when it came to money in politics. I have never had to take any of that back, whereas if you look up what most of my profession was then writing about the beefy, unscrupulous 'New Democrat,' you will be astonished at the quantity of sheer saccharine and drool. Anyway, I kept on about it even after most Republicans had consulted the opinion polls and decided it was a losing proposition, and if you look up the transcript of the eventual Senate trial of the president—only the second impeachment hearing in American history—you will see that the last order of business is a request (voted down) by the Senate majority leader to call Carol and me as witnesses. So I can dare to say that at least I saw it through.”
― Christopher Hitchens, Hitch 22: A Memoir

“I find as I grow older, I love those most, whom I loved first.”
― Th. Jefferson

“(The Mona Lisa), that really is the ugliest portrait I’ve seen, the only thing that supposedly makes it famous is the mystery behind it,” Katherine admitted as she remembered her trips to the Louvre and how she shook her head at the poor tourists crowding around to see a jaundiced, eyebrow-less lady that reminded her of tight-lipped Washington on the dollar bill. Surely, they could have chosen a better portrait of the First President for their currency?”
― E.A. Bucchianeri, Brushstrokes of a Gadfly

“After Katrina, I decided it's better to have a President who's competent rather than one who's beer-worthy.

Doonsebury”
― Garry B. Trudeau

“When was the last time an American president found it worth his while to write a speech on the importance of art and literature? I cannot recall. And yet at Yan’an, Mao said that art and literature were crucial to revolution. Conversely, he warned, art and literature could also be tools of domination. Art could not be separated from politics, and politics needed art in order to reach the people where they lived, through entertaining them.”
― Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Sympathizer

“Donald Trump’s economic policies are geared toward enriching White male power—but at the expense of most of his White male followers, along with the rest of us.”
― Ibram X. Kendi, How to Be an Antiracist

“Knowledge is in every country the surest basis of public happiness.”
― George Washington

“After Mr. Richard M. Nixon, I feel that sincerity is no longer possible as a public attitude.”
― Theodore Roethke, Straw for the Fire: From the Notebooks of Theodore Roethke

“The crowd waited with bated breath
as the first neurologically-enhanced lobster
elected President of the United States
clambered toward the podium.
The lobster hovered over the microphone,
clamped its claws and rubbed its antennae.
A storm of neurons fired inside its
ganglia, and its mandibles burbled out
a rousing acceptance speech.
The men whooped and hollered
at the significance of the moment,
while the women, relegated to years of
waiting for their turn, clapped tepidly.”
― Pedro Íñiguez, Mexicans on the Moon: Speculative Poetry from a Possible Future

“The Oval Office carpet is thick with Presidential semen. They look out of the window, think "I own you all" and jack off like ugly apes in humping season. It's what they live for. No one who wants that is to be trusted. Why can't you all see that?”
― Warren Ellis, Transmetropolitan, Vol. 3: Year of the Bastard

“Rosalynn went out of her way to plan entertainment for foreign dignitaries that was most likely to please them.”
― Jimmy Carter, A Full Life: Reflections at Ninety

“Many politically moderate Christians, including me, consider ourselves to be evangelicals, but the term has become increasingly equated with the religious right or the Moral Majority.”
― Jimmy Carter, A Full Life: Reflections at Ninety

“Donald Trump makes it hard on us pundits, cause he's so blatant there's nothing interesting to say.”
― David Brooks

“You're the president of the United States. You can do anything you want.”
― Donald Trump

“I think it's ageist," Emily said. "Is Joe Biden too old to be president?"

"That would be a valid question if he'd run against anyone but Trump," Kitzi said, cutting the deck for her.

"Amen," Susie said.”
― Stewart O'Nan, Evensong

“A new president, Barack Obama, claimed a seat,
the most powerful in all the land.
He demanded change and took a stand
with Michelle, Sasha, and Malia by his side.
They were their ancestors' dreams, the people's pride.”
― Ibi Zoboi, The People Remember