“I was criticized for being too much concerned with the average Canadians. I can't help that; I am one of them!”
September, 1967. Speech to PC convention, quoted in I Never Say Anything Provocative by Wente, Margaret. (Toronto: Peter Martin Associates Limited, 1975.)
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John Diefenbaker 9
13th Prime Minister of Canada 1895–1979Related quotes

“I am for people. I can't help it.”
As quoted in The Observer [London] (28 September, 1952)

“I am not so much concerned with the return on capital as I am with the return of capital.”
The Prudent Professor: Planning and Saving for a Worry-Free Retirement (2011) by Edwin M. Bridges, Brian D. Bridges;
Forbes Guide to the Markets: Becoming a Savvy Investor (2009) by Forbes, LLC, Marc M. Groz
The National Underwriter, Volume 45 (1941), p. 12: "As Eddie Cantor put it years ago, after getting burned in the stock market, the life insurance policyholder is more interested in the return of his money than in the return on it."
Misattributed

As quoted and paraphrased in "Not to Quit, Clemente Says" https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=48ZRAAAAIBAJ&sjid=2GsDAAAAIBAJ&pg=4385%2C3795732 by the Associated Press, in The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Friday, July 26, 1957), p. 14
Baseball-related, <big><big>1950s</big></big>, <big>1957</big>

Conversation with Konstantin Pulikovsky (Summer 2001), quoted in his book Orient Express
Behnke, Alison. Kim Jong Il's North Korea http://books.google.ba/books?id=cdQ8QZU6H0MC&printsec=frontcover&dq=kim+jong+il&source=bl&ots=qNQT5KQLoZ&sig=OguwgfrkTQ-eOqbqUCBWSnQAe-k&hl=hr&sa=X&ei=7VJWUPC3OK_74QSxmoGQBg&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=kim%20jong%20il&f=false
Variant: I know I'm an object of criticism in the world, but if I am being talked about, I must be doing the right things.
Wood, Christopher. "Terrible Hard", Says Alice. London: Constable. 1970. (chapter 13)

Address at Bennington College (30 October 1984) http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/09/28/reviews/malamud-reflections.html as published in "Reflections of a Writer: Long Work, Short Life" in The New York Times (20 March 1988); also in Talking Horse : Bernard Malamud on Life and Work (1996) edited by Alan Cheuse and Nicholas Delbanco, p. 35
Context: If I may, I would at this point urge young writers not to be too much concerned with the vagaries of the marketplace. Not everyone can make a first-rate living as a writer, but a writer who is serious and responsible about his work, and life, will probably find a way to earn a decent living, if he or she writes well. A good writer will be strengthened by his good writing at a time, let us say, of the resurgence of ignorance in our culture. I think I have been saying that the writer must never compromise with what is best in him in a world defined as free.

“I am only an average man, but by George, I work harder at it than the average man.”

“I helped her out of a jam, I guess, but I used a little too much force…”
Song lyrics, Blood on the Tracks (1975), Tangled Up In Blue