The elections are run by the same industries that sell toothpaste on television.

The human being is in the most literal sense a political animal, not merely a gregarious animal, but an animal which can individuate itself only in the midst of society.

Well, when you come down to it, I don’t see that a reporter could do much to a president, do you?

A frustration I have is that a lot of people increasingly seem to equate an advertising business model with somehow being out of alignment with your customers. I think it’s the most ridiculous concept.

Nixon was no more a saint than he was a great president.

I just didn’t want to get out there anymore; I didn’t want to get back into what I call ‚the swamp.‘ And the other reason why is I don’t think it’s good for the presidency for a former president to be opining about his successor. President Obama’s got plenty of critics – and I’m just not gonna be one.

In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of.

When Rumsfeld gets up on television and says we have definitive intelligence that al Qaeda is working with Iraq, how is an ordinary citizen supposed to react? They won’t tell you the evidence, and when anyone asks, they say, ‚Well, you know: It’s secret.‘

Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.

There will be no whitewash in the White House.

Are you a politician asking what your country can do for you or a zealous one asking what you can do for your country? If you are the first, then you are a parasite; if the second, then you are an oasis in the desert.

I took the Canal Zone and let Congress debate; and while the debate goes on, the canal does also.

If everyone demanded peace instead of another television set, then there’d be peace.

I know I’m more on television, and I’m more recognisable than maybe even the players because they run and train, but I just stand there, and my face does all these funny things that everyone can see all the time.

Democracy passes into despotism.

A President needs political understanding to run the government, but he may be elected without it.

Nowadays, politically, everybody is promising everything. That’s the only way you can get elected.

People make a big fuss over you when you’re President. But I’m very serious about doing everything I can to make sure that it doesn’t go to my head.

The voting booth joint is a great leveler; the whole neighborhood – rich, poor, old, young, decrepit and spunky – they all turn out in one day.

There’s nothing like white trash at the White House.

Rude people will now & then ask me why I think I know so much about Politics. I tell them it’s because I’m Smart… But that is a lie: The real reason is because I’m an incurable Gambling addict.

When George W. Bush came into office, North Korea had maybe one nuclear weapon and verifiably wasn’t producing any more.

The advice I’ve been giving to people all my life – that you may not be interested in the dialectic but the dialectic is interested in you; you can’t give up politics, it won’t give you up – was the advice I should have been taking myself.

There is a group of people that I think in good faith honestly believe that further curtailing our Second Amendment rights will enhance public safety. But there’s another group that just hates the Second Amendment.

There might be some serious fun in politics.

Idealism is the noble toga that political gentlemen drape over their will to power.

When governments rely increasingly on sophisticated public relations agencies, public debate disappears and is replaced by competing propaganda campaigns, with all the accompanying deceits. Advertising isn’t about truth or fairness or rationality, but about mobilising deeper and more primitive layers of the human mind.

I am often asked if, when I was secretary, I had problems with foreign men. That is not who I had problems with, because I arrived in a very large plane that said United States of America. I had more problems with the men in our own government.

I’m the president of the United States. I’m not the emperor of the United States.

I can’t imagine what this place would be – I can’t imagine what the country would be – with Donald Trump as our president.

I’ve done a number of Super Bowl ads. And that is the best advertising of the year. That is when people realize they’re going to be compared directly against other ads.

A low voter turnout is an indication of fewer people going to the polls.

Let advertisers spend the same amount of money improving their product that they do on advertising and they wouldn’t have to advertise it.

I was born. When I was 23 I started telling jokes. Then I started going on television and doing films. That’s still what I am doing. The end.

I got no quarrel with them Vietcong.

The thought of being President frightens me and I do not think I want the job.

I’ll be honest: I haven’t ruled politics out.

As president, I’m committed to making Washington work better and rebuilding the trust of the people who sent us here.

I’m going to be so much better a president for having been at the CIA that you’re not going to believe it.

I think Hillary Clinton is a phenomenal woman, and I’ve gotten to know her, and I think she’s made some pretty major contributions over the course of her life.

A faction willing to take the risks of making war on the ossified status quo in the Middle East can be described as many things, but not as conservative.

There is no gambling like politics.

Magnanimity in politics is not seldom the truest wisdom; and a great empire and little minds go ill together.

I’ve done many ads because that’s my new career. It’s an inspiring extension for my mind.

I’m a singer, not a politician, and I think you don’t want the two to get confused. It’s not OK to be on CNN talking about people starving and then tell the interviewer that your new album is coming out in six months.

I think, in politics, half the people are gonna like you, and half the people are not gonna like you, no matter what you do or what you say… It’s like there are no right answers. If there were, everyone would choose the right answers. They’re all opinions.

What consumerism really is, at its worst is getting people to buy things that don’t actually improve their lives.

Governments are supposed to lie to their citizens.

You notice how liberals keep saying, ‚If only Islam would have a Reformation‘ – it can’t have one. It says it can’t. It’s extremely dangerous in that way.

I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, that he’s African American.

People are finding it harder and harder to relate to foreign policy.

I don’t see any possibility of Britain and the U.S. allowing a sovereign independent Iraq; that’s almost inconceivable.

Domestic policy can only defeat us; foreign policy can kill us.

Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.

Competitions are a business, first and foremost.

A lot of advertising has gotten worse. I think it’s kind of lost its nerve, to be honest with you. I feel like the advertising of the ’60s, they were nervier. You know why? Because there was less at stake.

Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!

Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the form of kings to govern him? Let history answer this question.

If people wonder, yes, Hillary Clinton is my friend. She has been a friend to me and Barack and Malia and Sasha, and Bill and Chelsea have been embracing and supportive from the very day my husband took the oath of office.

Many things shall change in Cuba, but they shall change because of our efforts and despite the United States. Perhaps that empire shall crumble first.