Quotes about foreigner
page 8

Henry Campbell-Bannerman photo
Elton John photo
Anthony Burgess photo
Calvin Coolidge photo
Rajiv Malhotra photo
Will Eisner photo
Ben Bernanke photo
Ilana Mercer photo

“A bully's universe: US foreign policy operates upon the premise that American men and matériel should be capable of reaching and controlling all corners of the world.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

“Putin Saves Us From Ourselves,” http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=644 WorldNetDaily.com, March 23, 2012.
2010s, 2012

George F. Kennan photo

“A political society does not live to conduct foreign policy; it would be more correct to say that it conducts foreign policy in order to live.”

George F. Kennan (1904–2005) American advisor, diplomat, political scientist and historian

Lecture at Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey (March 1954); published in “The Two Planes of International Reality” in Realities of American Foreign Policy (1954), p. 4

Peter Cain photo
Amir Taheri photo
Mikhail Bulgakov photo

“Foreign visitors... how impressed you all are with foreign visitors! But they come in many different varieties.”

Book One in 'The Evil Apartment', B/O
The Master and Margarita (1967)

Sören Kierkegaard photo

“There was a time, and not so long ago, when one could score a success also here with a bit of irony, which compensated for all other deficiencies and helped one get through the world rather respectably, gave one the appearance of being cultured, of having a perspective on life, an understanding of the world, and to the initiated marked one as a member of an extensive intellectual freemasonry. Occasionally we still meet a representative of that vanished age who has preserved that subtle, sententious, equivocally divulging smile, that air of an intellectual courtier with which he has made his fortune in his youth and upon which he had built his whole future in the hope that he had overcome the world. Ah, but it was an illusion! His watchful eye looks in vain for a kindred soul, and if his days of glory were not still a fresh memory for a few, his facial expression would be a riddle to the contemporary age, in which he lives as a stranger and foreigner. Our age demands more; it demands, if not lofty pathos then at least loud pathos, if not speculation then at least conclusions, if not truth then at least persuasion, if not integrity then at least protestations of integrity, if not feeling then at least verbosity of feelings. Therefore it also coins a totally different kind of privileged faces. It will not allow the mouth to be defiantly compressed or the upper lip to quiver mischievously; it demands that the mouth be open, for how, indeed, could one imagine a true and genuine patriot who is not delivering speeches; how could one visualize a profound thinker’s dogmatic face without a mouth able to swallow the whole world; how could one picture a virtuoso on the cornucopia of the living world without a gaping mouth? It does not permit one to stand still and to concentrate; to walk slowly is already suspicious; and how could one even put up with anything like that in the stirring period in which we live, in this momentous age, which all agree is pregnant with the extraordinary? It hates isolation; indeed, how could it tolerate a person’s having the daft idea of going through life alone-this age that hand in hand and arm in arm (just like itinerant journeymen and soldiers) lives for the idea of community.”

Sören Kierkegaard (1813–1855) Danish philosopher and theologian, founder of Existentialism

Source: 1840s, On the Concept of Irony with Continual Reference to Socrates (1841), p. 246-247

Will Cuppy photo

“The Egyptians of the First Dynasty were already civilized in most respects. They had hieroglyphics, metal weapons for killing foreigners, numerous government officials, death, and taxes.”

Will Cuppy (1884–1949) American writer

The Decline and Fall of Practically Everybody (1950), Part I: It Seems There Were Two Egyptians, Cheops, or Khufu

Jeffrey Tucker photo
John Pilger photo
John R. Bolton photo
Donald J. Trump photo

“Our movement is about replacing a failed and corrupt political establishment with a new government controlled by you, the American people. The establishment has trillions of dollars at stake in this election. For those who control the levers of power in Washington and for the global special interests, they partner with these people that don't have your good in mind. The political establishment that is trying to stop us is the same group responsible for our disastrous trade deals, massive illegal immigration and economic and foreign policies that have bled our country dry. The political establishment has brought about the destruction of our factories and our jobs as they flee to Mexico, China and other countries all around the world. It's a global power structure that is responsible for the economic decisions that have robbed our working class, stripped our country of its wealth and put that money into the pockets of a handful of large corporations and political entities. The only thing that can stop this corrupt machine is you. The only force strong enough to save our country is us. The only people brave enough to vote out this corrupt establishment is you, the American people. I'm doing this for the people and the movement and we will take back this country for you and we will make America great again. I'm Donald Trump and I approve this message.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

Closing argument for America (4 November 2016)
Source: 2010s, 2016, November, Lines recycled from Trump's campaign rally in West Palm Beach, FL (10/13/2016)

Aldo Leopold photo
Francis Escudero photo
Robert P. George photo
Lee Kuan Yew photo
Mitsumasa Yonai photo

“There is no chance whatsoever of victory; therefore I agree with the foreign minister that the Potsdam declaration should be accepted at once, with only that one condition about retaining the Emperor.”

Mitsumasa Yonai (1880–1948) Prime Minister of Japan

Quoted in Lester Brooks, Behind Japan's Surrender: The Secret Struggle that Ended an Empire (1968), p. 66.

Plutarch photo
Lew Rockwell photo

“The Arabs made a profession of robbing and murdering the non-Muslims in the name of Allah, but they called it jihad. Egypt and Iran were the early casualties. It was the pillaged wealth and abducted daughters and sisters of the foreign nations which lent the golden touch to this Arab era.”

Anwar Shaikh (1928–2006) British Pakistani writer

Anwar Shaikh, Islam, The Arab National Movement, p. 54. quoted from Lal, K. S. (1999). Theory and practice of Muslim state in India. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan.

Ernest Bevin photo

“That won't do at all.. we've got to have this.. I don't mind for myself, but I don't want any other Foreign Secretary of this country to be talked to or at by a Secretary of State in the United States as I have just had in my discussions with Mr Byrnes. We've got to have this thing over here whatever it costs.. We've got to have the bloody Union Jack on top of it.”

Ernest Bevin (1881–1951) British labour leader, politician, and statesman

Peter Hennessy, "Cabinets and the Bomb", Oxford University Press 2007, p. 48.
Remarks at Cabinet Committee GEN75, 25 October 1946, about the development of the British atomic bomb.

Max Brod photo

“The presence of the kings of Islam is a great blessing from Allah… You should know that the country of Hindustan is a large land. In olden days, the kings of Islam had struggled hard and for long in order to conquer this foreign country. They could do it only in several turns…
Every (Muslim) king got mosques erected in his territory, and created madrasas. Muslims of Arabia and Ajam (non-Arab Muslim lands) migrated from their own lands and arrived in these territories. They became agents for the publicity and spread of Islam here. Uptil now their descendants are firm in the ways of Islam…Among the non-Muslim communities, one is that of the Marhatah (Maratha). They have a chief. For some time past, this community has been raising its head, and has become influential all over Hindustan…
…It is easy to defeat the Marhatah community, provided the ghãzîs of Islam gird up their loins and show courage…
In the countryside between Delhi and Agra, the Jat community used to till the land. In the reign of Shahjahan, this community had been ordered not to ride on horses, or keep muskets with them, or build fortresses for themselves. The kings that came later became careless, and this community has used the opportunity for building many forts, and collecting muskets…
In the reign of Muhammad Shah, the impudence of this community crossed all limits. And Surajmal, the cousin of Churaman, became its leader. He took to rebellion. Therefore, the city of Bayana which was an ancient seat of Islam, and where the Ulama and the Sufis had lived for seven hundred years, has been occupied by force and terror, and Muslims have been turned out of it with humiliation and hurt…
…Whatever influence and prestige is left with the kingship at present, is wielded by the Hindus. For no one except them is there in the ranks of managers and officials. Their houses are full of wealth of all varieties. Muslims live in a state of utter poverty and deprivation. The story is long and cannot be summarised. What I mean to say is that the country of Hindustan has passed under the power of non-Muslims. In this age, except your majesty, there is no other king who is powerful and great, who can defeat the enemies, and who is farsighted and experienced in war. It is your majesty’s bounden duty (farz-i-ain) to invade Hindustan, to destroy the power of the Marhatahs, and to free the down-and-out Muslims from the clutches of non-Muslims. Allah forbid, if the power of the infidels remains in its present position, Muslims will renounce Islam and not even a brief period will pass before Muslims become such a community as will no more know how to distinguish between Islam and non-Islam. This will be a great tragedy. Due to the grace of Allah, no one except your majesty has the capacity for preventing this tragedy from taking place.
We who are the servants of Allah and who recognise the Prophet as our saviour, appeal to you in the name of Allah that you should turn your holy attention to this direction and face the enemies, so that a great merit is added to the roll of your deeds in the house of Allah, and your name is included in the list of mujãhidîn fi Sabîlallah (warriors in the service of Allah). May you acquire plunder beyond measure, and may the Muslims be freed from the stranglehold of the infidels. I seek refuge in Allah when I say that you should not act like Nadir Shah who oppressed and suppressed the Muslims, and went away leaving the Marhatahs and the Jats whole and prosperous.
The enemies have become more powerful after Nadir Shah, the army of Islam has disintegrated, and the empire of Delhi has become childrens’ play. Allah forbid, if the infidels continue as at present, and Muslims get (further) weakened, the very name of Islam will get wiped out.
…When your fearsome army reaches a place where Muslims and non-Muslims live together, your administrators must take particular care. They must be instructed that those weak Muslims who live in the countryside should be taken to towns and cities. Next, some such administrators should be appointed in towns and cities as would see to it that the properties of Muslims are not plundered, and the honour of no Muslim is compromised.”

Shah Waliullah Dehlawi (1703–1762) Indian muslim scholar

Letter to Ahmad Shah Abdali, Ruler of Afghanistan. Translated from the Urdu version of K.A. Nizami, Shãh Walîullah Dehlvî ke Siyãsî Maktûbãt, Second Edition, Delhi, 1969, p.83 ff.
From his letters

Victor Davis Hanson photo

“[A] France or a Belgium is not quite a sovereign nation any more, and thus does not have complete control over its national destiny or foreign relations.”

Victor Davis Hanson (1953) American military historian, essayist, university professor

2010s, Europe at the Edge of the Abyss (2016)

Erich Ludendorff photo
Robert Cecil, 1st Viscount Cecil of Chelwood photo
Adolf Hitler photo
Elizabeth Wormeley Latimer photo
Charles Lindbergh photo
H. G. Wells photo
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi photo
Helmut Kohl photo

“We will cut in half unemployment and the number of foreigners living in Germany.”

Helmut Kohl (1930–2017) former chancellor of West Germany (1982-1990) and then the united Germany (1990-1998)

Wir werden die Arbeitslosigkeit und die Zahl der in Deutschland lebenden Ausländer um die Hälfte reduzieren.
Taz (June 10, 1998), during the 1982 election campaign

Calvin Coolidge photo
Robert Fisk photo
W. Averell Harriman photo

“Conferences at the top level are always courteous. Name calling is left to the foreign ministers.”

W. Averell Harriman (1891–1986) American businessman, politician and diplomat

Comment on the 1955 Geneva Summit, quoted in the CQ Weekly Report ( 1 August 1955 http://books.google.com/books?id=GN8tAAAAIAAJ&q=%22Conferences+at+the+top+level+are+always+courteous+Name+calling+is+left+to+the+foreign+ministers%22&pg=PA910#v=onepage)

Dean Acheson photo
Mary McCarthy photo
Mark Steyn photo
Jean-François Revel photo
Vladimir Lenin photo
Sushma Swaraj photo

“One of the issues that I discussed with (Sri Lankan Foreign) Minister (Mangala) Samaraweera was the importance of information technology for the development of both our countries [referring to India and Sri Lanka], and to take advantage of the opportunities that the new digital world offers”

Sushma Swaraj (1952–2019) Indian politician

Quoted on BGR (February 7, 2016), "India ready to offer assistance to Sri Lanka in IT sector: Sushma Swaraj" http://www.bgr.in/news/india-ready-to-offere-assistance-to-sri-lanka-in-it-sector-sushma-swaraj/

Herbert Marcuse photo
Donald J. Trump photo

“Our foreign policy is a complete and total disaster. No vision. No purpose. No direction. No strategy.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

2010s, 2016, April, Foreign Policy Speech (27 April 2016)

Norodom Ranariddh photo
James Hudson Taylor photo
Hillary Clinton photo
A. James Gregor photo
Will Eisner photo

“1920
The Times
London, Saturday, May 8, 1920.
“The Jewish peril.”
A disturbing pamphlet
Call for inquiry.
(From a correspondent.)
The Times has not as yet noticed this singular little book. Its diffusion is, however, increasing, and its reading is likely to perturb the thinking public. Never before have a race and a creed been accused of a more sinister conspiracy. We in this country, who live in good fellowship with numerous representatives of Jewry, may well ask that some authoritative criticism should deal with it., and either destroy the ugly “Semitic” body or assign their proper place to the insidious allegations of this kind of literature.
In spite of the urgency of impartial and exhaustive criticism, the pamphlet has been allowed, so far, to pass almost unchallenged. The Jewish Press announced, it is true, that the anti-semitism of the “Jewish Peril” was going to be exposed. But save for an unsatisfactory article in the March 5 issue of the ‘’Jewish Guardian’’ and for an almost equally unsatisfactory article in the March 5 issue of contribution to the ‘’Nation’’ of March 27, this exposure is yet to come. The article of the ‘’Jewish Guardian’’ is unsatisfactory, because it deals mainly with the personality of the author of the book in which the pamphlet is embodied, with Russian reactionary propaganda, and the Russian secret police. It does not touch the substance of the “Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion.” The purely Russian side of the book and its fervid “Orthodoxy.” Is not its most interesting feature. Its author-Professor S. Nilus-who was a minor official in the Department of Foreign Religions at Moscow, had, in all likelihood, opportunities of access to many archives and unpublished documents. On the other hand, the world-wide issue raised by the “Protocols” which he incorporated in his book and are now translated into English as “The Jewish Peril,” cannot fail not only to interest, but to preoccupy. What are the these of the “Protocols” with which, in the absence of public criticism, British readers have to grapple alone and unaided?”

Will Eisner (1917–2005) American cartoonist

The Plot: The Secret Story of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion (10/2/2005)

Richard Cobden photo
Ilana Mercer photo

“Inviting an invasion by foreigners and instigating one against them are two sides of the same neoconservative coin.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

“Border Invasion Abroad, Border Betrayal at Home,” http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=36630 WorldNetDaily.com, January 16, 2004;
“Bush/Necon Paradigm Made Explicit,” http://www.amnation.com/vfr/archives/003691.html referenced, View from the Right, Lawrence Auster website, July 7, 2005.
2000s, 2005

William Ewart Gladstone photo

“Good news from France, where the man picked by Nicolas Sarkozy as his foreign minister is not the execrable Hubert Védrine, but Bernard Kouchner - a socialist who supports Israel and the invasion of Iraq.”

Charles Foster Johnson (1953) American musician

May 18, 2007 http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=25539_Breaking-_New_French_FM_Doesnt_Hate_Israel&only

Noam Chomsky photo
Frances Kellor photo

“Americanization today is little more than an impulse, and its context, as popularly conceived, is both narrow and superficial. As French has been the language of diplomacy in the past, so English is to be the language of the reconstruction of the world. English is the language of 90,000,000 people living in America. The English language is a highway of loyalty; it is a medium of exchange; it is the open door to opportunity; it is a means of common defense. It is an implement of Americanization, but it is not necessarily Americanization. The American who thinks that America is united and safe when all men speak one language has only to look at Austria and to study the Jugo-Slav and Czecho-Slovak nationalistic movements. The imposition of a language is not the creation of nationalism. A common language is essential to a common understanding, and by all means let America open such a line of communication. The traffic that goes over this line is, however, the vital thing, and what that shall be and how it is to be prepared are matters to which but little thought has been given. Even those who urge the abolition of all other languages are indefinite about the restriction. Shall a man after he has learned English be allowed to get news in a foreign language paper and to worship in his native tongue; and if not, what becomes of the liberty which he is urged to learn English in order to appreciate? Are foreign languages to be encouraged as an expression of culture and to be denied as a means of economic and political expression? The English language campaigns in America have failed because they have not secured the support of the foreign-born. Men must have reasons for learning new languages, and America has never presented the case conclusively or satisfactorily. Furthermore, wherever the case has been presented, it has not been done with the proper facilities and under favorable conditions. The working day must not be so long that men cannot study.”

Frances Kellor (1873–1952) American sociologist

What is Americanization? (1919)

Akbar photo

“Akbar’s court was essentially foreign, and even in his later years the Indian element, whether Hindu or Moslem, constituted only a small proportion of the whole.”

Akbar (1542–1605) 3rd Mughal Emperor

Moreland, India at the Death of Akbar, quoted from Lal, K. S. (1994). Muslim slave system in medieval India. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan. Chapter 10

Jane Roberts photo
William James photo
David Lloyd George photo
Winston S. Churchill photo
Wilhelm Liebknecht photo
Ludwig Tieck photo

“The truly beautiful, the great and sublime, when it overpowers us with astonishment and admiration, still does not surprise us as a thing foreign, never heard of, never seen; but, on the other hand, our own inmost nature in such moments becomes clear to us, our deepest remembrances are awakened, our dearest feelings made alive.”

Ludwig Tieck (1773–1853) German poet, translator, editor, novelist, and critic

Das wahrhaft Schöne, Große und Erhabene, so wie es uns in Erstaunen und Verwunderung setzt, überrascht uns doch nicht als etwas Fremdes, Unerhörtes und Niegesehenes, sondern unser eigenstes Wesen wird uns in solchen Augenblicken klar, unsre tiefsten Erinnerungen werden erweckt, und unsre nächsten Empfindungen lebendig gemacht.
"Der Pokal", from Phantasus (1812-16) http://ftp.gwdg.de/pub/misc/gutenberg-de/1996/gutenb/tieck/pokal/pokal2.htm; translation from Thomas Carlyle German Romance: Specimens of its Chief Authors, (London: Tait, 1827), vol. 2, p. 163.

Aldous Huxley photo
John F. Kennedy photo
Haile Selassie photo

“When you begin to read a poem you are entering a foreign country whose laws and language and life are a kind of translation of your own; but to accept it because its stews taste exactly like your old mother's hash, or to reject it because the owl-headed goddess of wisdom in its temple is fatter than the Statue of Liberty, is an equal mark of that want of imagination, that inaccessibility to experience, of which each of us who dies a natural death will die.”

Randall Jarrell (1914–1965) poet, critic, novelist, essayist

"The Obscurity of the Poet," Harvard University lecture (15 August 1950) delivered at the Harvard University Summer School Conference on the Defense of Poetry (August 14-17, 1950); reprinted in Partisan Review, XVIII (January/February 1951) and published in Poetry and the Age (1953)
General sources
Variant: When you begin to read a poem you are entering a foreign country whose laws and language and life are a kind of translation of your own; but to accept it because its stews taste exactly like your old mother's hash, or to reject it because the owl-headed goddess of wisdom in its temple is fatter than the Statue of Liberty, is an equal mark of that want of imagination, that inaccessibility to experience, of which each of us who dies a natural death will die.

Calvin Coolidge photo

“The thirteen Colonies were not unaware of the difficulties which these problems presented. We shall find a great deal of wisdom in the method by which they dealt with them. When they were finally separated from Great Britain, the allegiance of their citizens was not to the Nation, for there was none. It was to the States. For the conduct of the war there had been a voluntary confederacy loosely constructed and practically impotent. Continuing after peace was made, when the common peril which had been its chief motive no longer existed, it grew weaker and weaker. Each of the States could have insisted on an entirely separate and independent existence, having full authority over both their internal and external affairs, sovereign in every way. But such sovereignty would have been a vain and empty thing. It would have been unsupported by adequate resources either of property or population, without a real national spirit; ready to fall prey to foreign intrigue or foreign conquest. That kind of sovereignty meant but little. It had no substance in it. The people and their leaders naturally sought for a larger, more inspiring ideal. They realized that while to be a citizen of a State meant something, it meant a great deal more if that State were a part of a national union. The establishment of a Federal Constitution giving power and authority to create a real National Government did not in the end mean a detriment, but rather an increment to the sovereignty of the several States. Under the Constitution there was brought into being a new relationship, which did not detract from but added to the power and the position of each State. It is true that they surrendered the privilege of performing certain acts for themselves, like the regulation of commerce and the maintenance of foreign relations, but in becoming a part of the Union they received more than they gave.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Freedom and its Obligations (1924)

Daniel Webster photo
John Steinbeck photo

“Mr. Pritchard was a businessman, president of a medium-sized corporation. He was never alone. His business was conducted by groups of men like himself who joined together in clubs so that no foreign element or idea could enter. His religious life was again his lodge and his church, both of which were screened and protected. One night a week he played poker with men so exactly like himself that the game was fairly even, and from this fact his group was convinced that they were very fine poker players. Wherever he went he was not one man but a unit in a corporation, a unit in a club, in a lodge, in a church, in a political party. His thoughts and ideas were never subjected to criticism since he willingly associated only with people like himself. He read a newspaper written by and for his group. The books that came into his house were chosen by a committee which deleted material that might irritate him. He hated foreign countries and foreigners because it was difficult to find his counterpart in them. He did not want to stand out from his group. He would like to have risen to the top of it and be admired by it; but it would not occur to him to leave it. At occasional stags where naked girls danced on the tables and sat in great glasses of wine, Mr. Pritchard howled with laughter and drank the wine, but five hundred Mr. Pritchards were there with him.”

Source: The Wayward Bus (1947), Ch. 3

Silvio Berlusconi photo

“Foreign press is usually leftist and describes us differently from what we really are.”

Silvio Berlusconi (1936) Italian politician

Speech to the association Azzurri nel mondo, Lugano (24 October 2004)
2004

K. R. Narayanan photo
Amit Chaudhuri photo
Thomas Friedman photo
Saint Patrick photo
M. S. Golwalkar photo
Wendy Doniger photo

“India is still foreign to me, it's a familiar foreignness in some way, but it's still surprising. When you see a temple in India, you don't say, oh there's another temple, you say: "My God! How could anyone have had the imagination to do something so amazing!"”

Wendy Doniger (1940) American Indologist

It's never what you expect.
About her comfort level staying in India.
Q&A with Wendy Doniger, the Mircea Eliade Distinguished Service Professor and author of The Hindus

Ilana Mercer photo

“Our adventurous foreign policy might be a necessary precondition for Muslim aggression but it is far from a sufficient one.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

"'Islamikazes' in Our Midst," http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=181WorldNetDaily.com, July 19, 2005.
2000s, 2005

William Ewart Gladstone photo