xy

@xy, member from Sept. 25, 2023

Favourite quotes (21448)

“When the commander in chief of a nation finds it necessary to order employees of the government or agencies of the government to do things that would technically break the law, he has to be able to declare it legal in order for them to do that.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

Response to the Frost-Nixon interviews on the Watergate scandal, UPI (21 May 1977)
1970s

“We're going forward with research on a new Orient Express that could, by the end of the decade, take off from Dulles Airport, accelerate up to 25 times the speed of sound, attaining low Earth orbit or flying to Tokyo within two hours.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

State of the Union address http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/speeches/1986/20486a.htm, , quoted in [1986-03-05, Michael Kilian, Hypersonic flight just a hyperbolic Reagan rhapsody, The Evening Independent, http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=950&dat=19860305&id=bmJQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=t1kDAAAAIBAJ&pg=4836,1112899] 1980s, Second term of office (1985–1989)

“By outlawing Solidarity, a free trade organization to which an overwhelming majority of Polish workers and farmers belong, they have made it clear that they never had any intention of restoring one of the most elemental human rights—the right to belong to a free trade union.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

Radio Address to the Nation on Solidarity and United States Relations With Poland http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=43110#axzz1Go825Y2t (1982-10-09). Compare with an earlier Reagan speech: "... where free unions and collective bargaining are forbidden, freedom is lost. They remind us that freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction." Labor Day Speech at Liberty State Park, Jersey City, New Jersey, September 1, 1980 http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/reference/9.1.80.html 1980s, First term of office (1981–1985)

“The decision by the seven-man majority in Roe v. Wade has so far been made to stick. But the Court's decision has by no means settled the debate. Instead, Roe v. Wade has become a continuing prod to the conscience of the nation.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

1980s, First term of office (1981–1985), Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation (1983)

“We cannot diminish the value of one category of human life — the unborn — without diminishing the value of all human life.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

1980s, First term of office (1981–1985), Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation (1983)

“It is possible that the Supreme Court itself may overturn its abortion rulings. We need only recall that in Brown v. Board of Education the court reversed its own earlier "separate-but-equal" decision.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

1980s, First term of office (1981–1985), Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation (1983)

“No Republican, no matter how liberal, is going to woo a Democratic vote; but a Republican bucking the giveaway trend might re-create some voters who have been staying home.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

1960 Letter from Reagan to Richard Nixon, As quoted in The New York Times (27 October 1984) http://www.nytimes.com/1984/10/27/us/on-the-record-text-of-1960-reagan-letter.html 1960s

“Next Tuesday all of you will go to the polls, will stand there in the polling place and make a decision. I think when you make that decision, it might be well if you would ask yourself, are you better off than you were four years ago?”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

Presidential debate (28 October 1980) http://www.juntosociety.com/pres_debates/carterreagan.html 1980s

“I favor the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and it must be enforced at the point of a bayonet, if necessary.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

As quoted in The Los Angeles Times (20 October 1965)
1960s

“Intelligence reports say he — Castro — is very worried about me. I'm very worried that we can't come up with something to justify his worrying.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

White House diary (11 February 1981) as quoted in "Reagan's diaries to be published", BBC News (2 May 2007) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6614077.stm 1980s, First term of office (1981–1985)

“Peace is not the absence of conflict, but the ability to cope with conflict by peaceful means.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

"Address at Commencement Exercises at Eureka College in Illinois," May 9, 1982. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=42501 1980s, First term of office (1981–1985)

“However, our task is far from over. Our friends in the other party will never forgive us for our success, and are doing everything in their power to rewrite history. Listening to the liberals, you'd think that the 1980's were the worst period since the Great Depression, filled with suffering and despair. I don't know about you, but I'm getting awfully tired of the whining voices from the White House these days. They're claiming there was a decade of greed and neglect, but you and I know better than that. We were there.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

Speech at 1994 Gala for 83rd Birthday http://odur.let.rug.nl/~usa/P/rr40/speeches/gala_speech.htm (3 February 1994) Post-presidency (1989&ndash;2004)

“This country now possesses the strongest credit in the world. The full consequences of a default or even the serious prospect of default by the United States are impossible to predict and awesome to contemplate. Denigration of the full faith and credit of the United States would have substantial effects on the domestic financial markets and on the value of the dollar in exchange markets. The Nation can ill afford to allow such a result. The risks, the cost, the disruptions, and the incalculable damage lead me to but one conclusion: the Senate must pass this legislation before the Congress adjourns.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

Letter to Majority Leader Howard Baker http://cpc.grijalva.house.gov/uploads/CPC_Reagan_Letter.pdf, urging an increase in public debt ceiling (16 November 1983) 1980s, First term of office (1981–1985)

“Every morning Nancy and I turn to see what he has to say about people of our respective birth signs.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

Regarding his friend Hollywood astrologer Carroll Righter, in Where's the Rest of Me? (1965)
1960s

“We must all educate ourselves to the reality of the horrors taking place. Doctors today know that unborn children can feel a touch within the womb and that they respond to pain.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

1980s, First term of office (1981–1985), Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation (1983)

“It's silly talking about how many years we will have to spend in the jungles of Vietnam when we could pave the whole country and put parking stripes on it and still be home by Christmas.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

As quoted in The Fresno Bee (10 October 1965)
1960s

“George [H. W. Bush] brought his ne'er-do-well son around this morning and asked me to find the kid a job. Not the political one who lives in Florida. The one who hangs around here all the time looking shiftless. This so-called kid is already almost 40 and has never had a real job.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

Cited to a Reagan diary entry in 1986, but actually from a parody written by Michael Kinsley in June 2007.
Misattributed

“I do not believe in taking away the right of the citizen to own guns for sporting, hunting and so forth, or for home defense. But I do believe that an AK-47, a machine gun, is not a sporting weapon.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

At the University of Southern California (February 6, 1989) when asked his opinion on gun control after the January 17, 1989 Cleveland Elementary School shooting that killed five schoolchildren in Stockton ([Becklund, Laurie, `Saddled Up' Reagan Vows to Speak on Issues, Los Angeles Times, February 7, 1989, 1]).
Post-presidency (1989–2004)

“The doctor begins to lose freedom.... First you decide that the doctor can have so many patients. They are equally divided among the various doctors by the government. But then doctors aren’t equally divided geographically. So a doctor decides he wants to practice in one town and the government has to say to him, you can't live in that town. They already have enough doctors. You have to go someplace else. And from here it's only a short step to dictating where he will go.... All of us can see what happens once you establish the precedent that the government can determine a man's working place and his working methods, determine his employment. From here it's a short step to all the rest of socialism, to determining his pay. And pretty soon your son won't decide, when he's in school, where he will go or what he will do for a living. He will wait for the government to tell him where he will go to work and what he will do.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

Ronald Reagan Speaks Out Against Socialized Medicine (1961 LP)
1960s

“I know what I'm about to say now is controversial, but I have to say it. This nation cannot continue turning a blind eye and a deaf ear to the taking of some 4,000 unborn children's lives every day. That's one every 21 seconds. One every 21 seconds. We cannot pretend that America is preserving her first and highest ideal, the belief that each life is sacred, when we've permitted the deaths of 15 million helpless innocents since the Roe versus Wade decision. 15 million children who will never laugh, never sing, never know the joy of human love, will never strive to heal the sick, feed the poor, or make peace among nations. Abortion has denied them the first and most basic of human rights. We are all infinitely poorer for their loss. There's another grim truth we should face up to: Medical science doctors confirm that when the lives of the unborn are snuffed out, they often feel pain, pain that is long and agonizing. This nation fought a terrible war so that black Americans would be guaranteed their God-given rights. Abraham Lincoln recognized that we could not survive as a free land when some could decide whether others should be free or slaves. Well, today another question begs to be asked: How can we survive as a free nation when some decide that others are not fit to live and should be done away with? I believe no challenge is more important to the character of America than restoring the right to life to all human beings. Without that right, no other rights have meaning. "Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for such is the kingdom of God."”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

I will continue to support every effort to restore that protection including the Hyde-Jepsen respect life bill. I've asked for your all-out commitment, for the mighty power of your prayers, so that together we can convince our fellow countrymen that America should, can, and will preserve God's greatest gift. Remarks at the Annual Convention of the National Religious Broadcasters (30 January 1984) http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=40394 · YouTube - Remarks at the Annual Convention of the National Religious Broadcasters https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Elph9CfsKs 1980s, First term of office (1981–1985)