Quotes About Leadership

Twenty five years later the sheriff was gone, but Sherrod was still in Albany, organizing farming cooperatives.)

I miss Nixon. Compared to these Nazis we have in the White House now, Richard Nixon was a flaming liberal.

The main problem in any democracy is that crowd-pleasers are generally brainless swine who can go out on a stage & whup their supporters into an orgiastic frenzy—then go back to the office & sell every one of the poor bastards down the tube for a nickel apiece.

A lot of blood has gone under the bridge since then, and we have all learned a hell of a lot about the realities of Politics in America. Even the politicians have learned – but, as usual, the politicians are much slower than the people they want to lead.

How low do you have to stoop in this country to be President?

McGovern made some stupid mistakes, but in context they seem almost frivolous compared to the things Richard Nixon does every day of his life, on purpose, as a matter of policy and a perfect expression of everything he stands for. Jesus! Where will it end? How low do you have to stoop in this country to be President?

The first time I managed to pick up a basketball I knew I was destined to lead the UK to another National championship. ... Even now, so many years later, I still believe Kentucky will go undefeated in March & win everything.

If we start electing presidents on the basis of their sexual purity, some real monsters will get into the White House.

Sending Muskie against Nixon would have been like sending a three-toed sloth out to seize turf from a wolverine.

This is old politicians, says Joel Swerdlow, the twenty-six-year-old who ran McGovern's operation in the North half of Milwaukee. We have precinct captains, ward leaders, car captains, the whole bit. That's the only way you win. But instead of patronage bosses and sewer commissioners, we've got young people who work because they're interested in the issues.

Jesus! Where will it end? How low do you have to stoop in this country to be President?

But Muskie was the one who could beat Nixon or unite the party or was the clear leader—or any of those other phrases of antiquity.

These things happen. One day you run everything, and the next day you run like a dog.

Pakistan has been unfortunate that its leaders and rulers have repeatedly chosen ideological wooden-headedness over pursuit of reasonable and viable options.

The campaign for Pakistan had, in its final stages, become a religious movement even though its leaders initiated it as a formula for resolving post-independence constitutional problems. This created confusion about Pakistan's raison d'être, which Pakistan's leadership has attempted to resolve through a state ideology.

Such power as I possess for working in the political field has derived from my experiments in the spiritual field.

Because this second position is powered by the hope that there may someday be a single world religion, it is well to remind ourselves again of the human element in the religious equation. There are people who want to have their own followers. They would prefer to head their own flock, however small, than be second-in-command in the largest congregation. This suggests that if we were to find ourselves with a single religion tomorrow, it is likely that there would be two the day after. p386

He renamed India's untouchables harijan, "God's people," and raised them to human stature. And in doing so he provided the nonviolent strategy as well as the inspiration for Martin Luther King, Jr.'s comparable civil rights movement in the United States. Gandhi

Historical figures lose their center when they become anxious over the outcome of their actions.

The Greek Orthodox bishops made a point of snubbing John Paul. He didn't complain. They insulted him. He didn't defend himself. They demanded he apologize for Catholic sins from centuries ago. And John Paul, speaking on behalf of one billion living souls and the untold Catholic dead, apologized.

Sir, did you not hear the orders of the King? Bailly replied: ...It seems o me that the nation assembled cannot take orders.

I accuse you of marching towards supreme power. - said by Jean-Baptiste Louvet to Robespierre (1792)

If I were to put a date on it, I would say that the French Revolution finally came to rest after almost exactly 180 years, on April 28, 1969, when President de Gaulle resigned in a huff and the Fifth Republic, which he had founded, sailed on without him without a tremor.

Once a King, always a King. But once a Knight is enough!