Quotes about republican (761 quotes, page 7)

“If we go by verbal measures, Donald Trump is certainly the more divisive of the two if only because of his tongue-lashing of Latinos, Muslims and even Republican Party grandees. But if action is the measure, Hillary Clinton might be the more divisive. The reason is that, rightly or wrongly, she is seen as the continuator of Obama’s tenure; many Americans see her presidency as a third term for the incumbent. Another President Clinton might mean another four years of internecine feuds in the United States. And that would be bad for America and bad for the world, including the Middle East.”

Amir Taheri (1942) Iranian journalist

Opinion: Clinton or Trump – Better or Less Bad? http://english.aawsat.com/2016/11/article55361471/opinion-clinton-trump-better-less-bad, Ashraq Al-Awsat (November 4, 2016)

World

“To be a progressive, then, means being a partisan—at least for now. The only way a progressive agenda can be enacted is if Democrats have both the presidency and a large enough majority in Congress to overcome Republican opposition. And achieving that kind of political preponderance will require leadership that makes opponents of the progressive agenda pay a political price for their obstructionism—leadership that, like FDR, welcomes the hatred of the interest groups trying to prevent us from making our society better.”

Paul Krugman book The Conscience of a Liberal

Source: The Conscience of a Liberal (2007), Ch. 13. The Conscience of a Liberal

Way

“In televisionland we are all sophisticated enough now to realize that every statistic has an equal and opposite statistic somewhere in the universe. It is not a candidate's favorite statistic per se that engages us, but the assurance with which he can use it.
We are testing the candidates for self-confidence, for "Presidentiality" in statistical bombardment. It doesn't really matter if their statistics be homemade. What settles the business is the cool with which they are dropped.
And so, as the second half hour treads the decimaled path toward the third hour, we become aware of being locked in a tacit conspiracy with the candidates. We know their statistics go to nothing of importance, and they know we know, and we know they know we know.
There is total but unspoken agreement that the "debate," the arguments which are being mustered here, are of only the slightest importance.
As in some primitive ritual, we all agree — candidates and onlookers — to pretend we are involved in a debate, although the real exercise is a test of style and manners. Which of the competitors can better execute the intricate maneuvers prescribed by a largely irrelevant ritual?
This accounts for the curious lack of passion in both performers. Even when Ford accuses Carter of inconsistency, it is done in a flat, emotionless, game-playing style. The delivery has the tuneless ring of an old press release from the Republican National Committee. Just so, when Carter has an opportunity to set pulses pounding by denouncing the Nixon pardon, he dances delicately around the invitation like a maiden skirting a bog.
We judge that both men judge us to be drained of desire for passion in public life, to be looking for Presidents who are cool and noninflammable. They present themselves as passionless technocrats using an English singularly devoid of poetry, metaphor and even coherent forthright declaration.
Caught up in the conspiracy, we watch their coolness with fine technical understanding and, in the final half hour, begin asking each other for technical judgments. How well is Carter exploiting the event to improve our image of him? Is Ford's television manner sufficiently self-confident to make us sense him as "Presidential"?
It is quite extraordinary. Here we are, fully aware that we are being manipulated by image projectionists, yet happily asking ourselves how obligingly we are submitting to the manipulation. It is as though a rat running a maze were more interested in the psychologist's charts on his behavior than in getting the cheese at the goal line.”

Russell Baker (1925–2019) writer and satirst from the United States

"And All of Us So Cool" (p.340)
There's a Country in My Cellar (1990)

Life , Men , Behavior , Exercises

“[On the Iraq War] I am against the war, but I do support our white troops. [laughter, long pause] No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. I'm not a Republican. I'm not a member of the party of inclusion. Wonderful, tolerant, rational human beings they are…”

David Cross (1964) American comedian, writer and actor

It's Not Funny

War , Support , Laughter

“The United States is the only country with a known birthday. All the rest began, they know not when, and grew into power, they know not how. If there had been no Independence Day, England and America combined would not be so great as each actually is. There is no "Republican," no "Democrat," on the Fourth of July — all are Americans. All feel that their country is greater than party.”

James G. Blaine (1830–1893) American Republican politician

Oration on Independence Day

Feeling , Birthday , Country

“I think, to many conservatives, many Republicans, it was reassuring, in the sense that this was the first time we have seen a president, a conservative president, really express vocally at a press conference the bias he feels and many of us feel has been given in the coverage toward the Trump administration. And so he’s sort of holding the press’ feet to the fire while he’s taking their questions. And it’s combative. It’s interesting. I think you are going to see a lot more people tuning in to these press conferences. It used to be that conservatives who were in government, like myself, we would get what we felt was unfair coverage, we’d go home, we would grumble, we would complain about it, but we actually wouldn’t say anything to the reporter or to the reporters while they’re asking us additional questions. He’s very confrontational. And I think that’s refreshing. So I think it actually is going to be good. And I think the public is going to take an interest in these press conferences much more so than in past presidencies.”

Kris Kobach (1966) American politician

Does Trump’s confrontational style help him as president? https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/trumps-confrontational-style-help-president (February 16, 2017)

People , Feeling , Home , Question

“Good jobs begin with good schools, and here we've made a fine start. Republicans and Democrats worked together to achieve historic education reform so that no child is left behind. I was proud to work with members of both parties: Chairman John Boehner and Congressman George Miller. Senator Judd Gregg. And I was so proud of our work, I even had nice things to say about my friend, Ted Kennedy. I know the folks at the Crawford coffee shop couldn't believe I'd say such a thing, but our work on this bill shows what is possible if we set aside posturing and focus on results.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2002, State of the Union address (January 2002)

Education , School , Coffee

“Aside from the wisdom of going to war as Bush wants, I am troubled by who pays for his capricious adventure into world domination. The administration admits to a cost of around $200 billion! Now, wealthy individuals won't pay. They've got big tax cuts already. Corporations won't pay. They'll cook the books and move overseas and then send their contributions to the Republicans. Rich kids won't pay. Their daddies will get them deferments as Big George did for George W. Well then, who will pay? School kids will pay. There'll be no money to keep them from being left behind -- way behind. Seniors will pay. They'll pay big time as the Republicans privatize Social Security and rob the Trust Fund to pay for the capricious war. Medicare will be curtailed and drugs will be more unaffordable. And there won't be any money for a drug benefit because Bush will spend it all on the war. Working folks will pay through loss of job security and bargaining rights. Our grandchildren will pay through the degradation of our air and water quality. And the entire nation will pay as Bush continues to destroy civil rights, women's rights and religious freedom in a rush to phony patriotism and to courting the messianic Pharisees of the religious right.”

Pete Stark (1931–2020) American politician

Statement on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives, October 8, 2002, in opposition to the resolution authorizing military force against Iraq

Wisdom , Women , Money , War

“You may recall that a few weeks ago, President Obama came to this chamber, and he addressed the chamber on health care before a joint session of the House and the Senate. During that session I was privileged to be here, and I saw my colleagues on the far side of the aisle, the Republicans, waving pieces of paper during his speech, and I was wondering what they were. I couldn’t imagine — it almost seemed like they wanted President Obama’s autograph. I just didn’t get it. I heard from one of my colleagues that this is what they called the Republican health care plan. I went over, after the speech was over, I picked up a copy that was lying down on the Republican side, and it turns out that the Republicans’ health care plan was a blank piece of paper. I inquired further, trying to find out exactly what the Republicans’ health care plan is. And it’s my duty and pride tonight to be able to announce exactly what the Republicans plan to do for health care in America.”

Alan Grayson (1958) American politician

2009

Health , Imagination , Lying , Housing

“Why are Republicans older than Democrats? Because it takes awhile for life to beat the stupid out of you, that's why.”

Bill Whittle (1959) author, director, screenwriter, editor

Bill Whittle's Keynote speech https://vimeo.com/162748223 at the David Horowitz Freedom Center's 2016 West Coast Retreat (8 April 2016)
2010s

Life , Stupidity

“If one of the main reasons for passing the Gang of Eight immigration bill is so Republicans can prove that they don't hate Hispanics, then what's next? Are the Republicans going to have to support gay marriage to prove that they don't hate gays? Are the Republicans then going to have to support affirmative action to prove they don't hate blacks?”

Rush Limbaugh (1951) U.S. radio talk show host, Commentator, author, and television personality

Hate , Marriage , Support

“Said Saint Augustine, 'The confession of evil works is the first beginning of good works.' The Republican Party under Bush did the devil's work. Bar the sainted Ron Paul, not a dog of a Republican lifted his leg in protest of the unjust war on Iraq. To embark on the good, the GOP must come clean about the bad.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

"Making America great means exposing 'W'," http://praag.org/?p=21693 Praag.org, February 20, 2016.
2010s, 2016

War , Dogs , Evil

“No man can defend or palliate such conduct as that of Smith O'Brien and his confederates. It would be a mercy to shut them up in a lunatic asylum. They are not seeking a repeal of the legislative union, but the establishment of the Kings of Munster and Connaught! But the sad side of the picture is in fact that we are doing nothing to satisfy the moderate party in Ireland, nothing which strengthens the hands even of John O'Connell and the priest party, who are opposed to the 'red republicans' of the Dublin clubs. There seems to be a strong impression here that this time there is to be a rebellion in Ireland. But I confess I have ceased to fear or hope anything from that country. Its utter helplessness to do anything for itself is our great difficulty. You can't find three Irishmen who will co-operate together for any rational object.”

Richard Cobden (1804–1865) English manufacturer and Radical and Liberal statesman

Letter to Henry Ashworth (21 July 1848), quoted in John Morley, The Life of Richard Cobden (London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1905), p. 488.
1840s

Sadness , Fear , Hope , Strong

“What happens if that big [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_wall_(politics)#Red_wall red wall] is ever breached? If it is, our state and our country will fundamentally change and we can never, ever let that happen. The Republican Party must remain a bulwark against European democratic socialism which unfortunately the Democratic Party has become. In order top do that we have to grow our party, and we have to grow it among young people and among minorities, we have to become more inclusive, but what I mean by that is we do not abandon our ideas, we need to stand even more firm.”

Glenn Jacobs (1967) American professional wrestler and actor

3:16–4:13.
Glenn Jacobs's victory speech after winning race for Knox County Mayor https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RC68lyf3-vw (2018)

People , Idea , Change , Country

“A great leader has to be flexible, holding his ground on the major principles but finding room for compromises that can bring people together. A great leader has to be savvy at negotiations so we don't drown every bill in pork barrel bridges to nowhere. I know how to stand my ground — but I also know that Republicans and Democrats need to find common ground to stand on as well.”

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

Source: 2010s, 2015, Crippled America: How to Make America Great Again (2015), p. 96

People

“The Republican Party stands for individual liberty and free markets; its the party of growth, its the part of economic opportunity, those are things that benefit everyone. That's how we need to grow this party, by ensuring that those are the ideas that we are spreading.”

Glenn Jacobs (1967) American professional wrestler and actor

4:14–4:38
Glenn Jacobs's victory speech after winning race for Knox County Mayor https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RC68lyf3-vw (2018)

Idea , Parting

“"My view is FOX News is a propaganda outlet for the Republican Party and I don't comment on FOX News." --June 12, 2005”

Howard Dean (1948) American political activist

http://abclocal.go.com/wls/news/061205_ns_howard_dean.html

“Several weeks before General Patton died in a command car accident in 1945, he visited my headquarters at Ingolstadt. Over lunch he remarked on a recent visit he had made to the United States where the press had castigated him for referring to the Nazis as a political party "like Republicans or Democrats". "Westy," he told me solemnly, "don't forget when you return to the States, be careful what you say. No matter what, they'll put it in the newspapers." It seemed remote advice at the time for a young, inauspicious colonel, but I was to have ample reason in later years to reflect on his counsel.”

William Westmoreland book A Soldier Reports

Source: A Soldier Reports (1976), p. 22.

Cars , Time , Forgetting

“In choosing a president, we really don't choose a Republican or Democrat, a conservative or liberal. We choose a leader.”

Rudy Giuliani (1944–2001) American businessperson and politician, former mayor of New York City

Speech before the Republican Party convention in New York. August 30, 2004. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3613480.stm

“The antagonist to the Republican Party has been the Democrats, the party of collective subjugation and individual enslavement. Then physical, now economic. The first black members of the U. S. House and Senate were Republicans. The first civil rights legislation came from Republicans. Democrats gave us the KKK, Jim Crow, lynchings, poll taxes, literacy tests, and failed policies like the 'Great Society'. Republican President Eisenhower ordered troops to enforce school desegregation. Republican Senator Everett Dirksen enabled the 1964 civil rights legislation to pass, in opposition to Democrat Senators Robert Byrd, a KKK Grand Wizard, and Al Gore, Sr.”

Allen West (politician) (1961) American politician; retired United States Army officer

2010s, Voting Democratic for the next 200 years (2014)

School , Housing

“But this time, and particularly in front of this crowd, it felt far more urgent to point out the hypocrisy of our side. How can conservative women hope to have any credibility on the subject of sexual harassment or relations between the sexes when they excuse the behavior of President Trump? And how can we participate in any conversation about sexual ethics when the Republican president and the Republican Party backed a man (Roy Moore) credibly accused of child molestation for the United States Senate? I watched my fellow panelists’ eyes widen. And then the booing began. I’d been dreading it for days, but when it came, I almost welcomed it. There is nothing more freeing than telling the truth. And it must be done, again and again, by those of us who refuse to be absorbed into this brainless, sinister, clownish thing called Trumpism, by those of us who refuse to overlook the fools, frauds and fascists attempting to glide along in his slipstream into respectability. I spoke to a hostile audience for the sake of every person who has watched this spectacle of mendacity in disbelief and misery for the past two years. Just hearing the words you know are true can serve as ballast, steadying your mind when so much seems unreal.”

Mona Charen (1957) political writer

I'm Glad I Got Booed at CPAC (2018)

Women , Hostility , Truth , Hope

“I think almost everyone, including me, thought the election of our first black president would lead to new efforts to improve the dismal economic condition of African-Americans. In fact, Obama has seldom touched on the issue of race, and when he has he has emphasized the conservative themes of responsibility and self-help. Even when Republicans have suppressed minority voting, in a grotesque campaign to fight nonexistent voter fraud, Obama has said and done nothing.”

Bruce Bartlett (1951) American historian

2010s, Obama is a Republican (2014)

Fraud , Thinking , Effort , Help

“The good Lord had had a chance for a long time before the abolition. I believe that there is a moral government; and that God reigns. I am no pessimist; I give thanks to the good Lord, and also to the good men through whom He has worked. Prominent among them was Garrison, and scarcely less so was Phillips. It was they and their associates who made Abraham Lincoln and the Republican party possible. What abolished slavery was the moral sentiment which had been created, not by the pulpit, but by the Garrisonian platform. The churches did not do much to abolish slavery; but they did much to keep the agitation down.”

Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman

1890s, Speech at Tremont Temple (1890)

Men , God , Chance , Time

“To the cheater, there is no such thing as honesty, and to Republicans the idea of serving the public good is counterfeit on the face of it — they never felt such an urge, and therefore it must not exist.”

Garrison Keillor (1942) American radio host and writer

Homegrown Democrat : A Few Plain Thoughts From the Heart of America (2004), p. 78

Idea

“I am Bourbon as a matter of honour, royalist according to reason and conviction, and republican by taste and character.”

François-René de Chateaubriand (1768–1848) French writer, politician, diplomat and historian

"De la restauration et de la monarchie élective" (1831).

“Under the rubric of conservatism, the Republican party of Bush I and II has been reinventing itself into what conservatives would have once recognized as a Rockefeller party reciting Reaganite rhetoric.”

Patrick Buchanan (1938) American politician and commentator

2000s, Where the Right Went Wrong (2004)

“I have been thinking that I would make a proposition to my Republican friends… that if they will stop telling lies about the Democrats, we will stop telling the truth about them.”

Adlai Stevenson (1900–1965) mid-20th-century Governor of Illinois and Ambassador to the UN

Campaign statement in Fresno, California (10 September 1952); earlier incidence of similar comments exist:
If Mr. Hughes will stop lying about me, I will stop telling the truth about him.
William Randolph Hearst, about Charles Evans Hughes, in 1906, as quoted in The Quote Verifier : Who Said What, Where, and When (2006) by Ralph Keyes
If you will refrain from telling any lies about the Republican Party, I'lll promise not to tell the truth about the Democrats.
Chauncey Depew, as quoted in "If Elected I Promise … "Stories and Gems of Wisdom by and About Politicians (1969) by John F. Parker

Truth , Thinking

“Donald Trump is right. We are at war and our homeland security and immigration policies are a complete mess. The Syrian refugee issue and the Islamic terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino have kick-started a much needed debate and have brought some alarming information to the American people. It starts with basic government incompetence and the suffocating PC culture that Republican and Democrat establishment leaders are slaves to along with the liberal media.”

David Bossie (1965) American political activist

Conservatives Should Think Bigger On Immigration Ban http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/12/11/conservatives-should-think-bigger-on-immigration-ban/ (December 11, 2015)

War , People

“On Bush "Free Trade" policies, the Republican Party has signed off on economic treason.”

Patrick Buchanan (1938) American politician and commentator

2000s, Where the Right Went Wrong (2004)

“Roy Cohn and Joe McCarthy will be redeemed when the people have taken back their government from the criminal alliance of Communists, Socialists, New Dealers and the Eisenhower-Dewey Republicans.”

George Reisman (1937) American economist

"One Enchanted Evening" http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,936247,00.html, Time Magazine (Aug. 9, 1954)

People

“The Constitution forbids the passing of a bill of attainder: that is, a law entailing upon the child the disabilities and hardships imposed upon the parent. Every slave law in America might be repealed on this very ground. The slave is made a slave because his mother is a slave. But to all this it is said that the practice of the American people is against my view. I admit it. They have given the Constitution a slaveholding interpretation. I admit it. Thy have committed innumerable wrongs against the Negro in the name of the Constitution. Yes, I admit it all; and I go with him who goes farthest in denouncing these wrongs. But it does not follow that the Constitution is in favor of these wrongs because the slaveholders have given it that interpretation. To be consistent in his logic, the City Hall speaker must follow the example of some of his brothers in America — he must not only fling away the Constitution, but the Bible. The Bible must follow the Constitution, for that, too, has been interpreted for slavery by American divines. Nay, more, he must not stop with the Constitution of America, but make war with the British Constitution, for, if I mistake not, the gentleman is opposed to the union of Church and State. In America he called himself a Republican. Yet he does not go for breaking down the British Constitution, although you have a Queen on the throne, and bishops in the House of Lords.”

Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman

1860s, The Constitution of the United States: Is It Pro-Slavery or Anti-Slavery? (1860)

War , People , Law , Parent

“Through its support of mass immigration, its paralysis in power to prevent 12-20 million illegal aliens from entering and staying, its failure to address the “anchor-baby” issue, the Republican Party has birthed a new electorate that will send it the way of the Whigs.”

Patrick Buchanan (1938) American politician and commentator

2010s, Suicide of a Superpower (2011)

Way , Birth , Failure , Support

“I am highly at ease and calm because we have a fairly republican king.”

José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero (1960) Former Prime Minister of Spain

"For me, a republican is someone who defends public institutions and democratic values, someone who is a defender of public life, someone who repsects the principles of liberty, so in that sense we are very calm and at ease."
14th April 2005, during a commemoration to the Second Republic.
Sources: ABC: Rajoy critica el «alarde intelectual» de Zapatero de llamar republicano al Rey http://www.abc.es/hemeroteca/historico-15-04-2005/abc/Nacional/rajoy-critica-el-alarde-intelectual-de-zapatero-de-llamar-republicano-al-rey_201845247092.html (Spanish),
As President, 2005

“When Texas became one of the United States, she entered into an indissoluble relation. All the obligations of perpetual union, and all the guaranties of republican government in the Union, attached at once to the state. The Act which consummated her admission into the Union was something more than a compact; it was the incorporation of a new member into the political body. And it was final.”

Salmon P. Chase (1808–1873) Chief Justice of the United States

Texas v. White http://blog.constitutioncenter.org/2012/11/constitution-check-can-texas-get-constitutional-permission-to-leave-the-union/

“In 1960, the U. S. population was 89% white. By 1990, it was 76%. Today, it is under 70%. By 2050, white Americans, the most loyal voting bloc the Republican Party has, that provides 90% of all GOP votes, will be just another minority because of an immigration policy championed by Republicans. When John Stuart Mill called the Tories "the Stupid Party," he was not entirely wrong.”

Patrick Buchanan (1938) American politician and commentator

2010s, State of Emergency (2006)

Stupidity

“I think if Obama is reelected, then that'll be a disaster of immeasurable proportions. If the government takes over large segments of the economy, we will become a socialist state. The salvation of the Republican Party, and of the country and of the world, will be changing the conservative moment to reflect the principles of Abraham Lincoln. The platform on which Lincoln was elected in 1860 quoted part of the Declaration of Independence. Government is based on the consent of the governed.”

Harry V. Jaffa (1918–2015) American historian and collegiate professor

2010s, Interview with Eric Benson (2012)

World , Quotes , Thinking , Change

“In the past, the United States has sometimes, kind of sardonically, been described as a one-party state: the business party with two factions called Democrats and Republicans. That’s no longer true. It’s still a one-party state, the business party. But it only has one faction. The faction is moderate Republicans, who are now called Democrats. There are virtually no moderate Republicans in what’s called the Republican Party and virtually no liberal Democrats in what’s called the Democratic [sic] Party. It’s basically a party of what would be moderate Republicans and similarly, Richard Nixon would be way at the left of the political spectrum today. Eisenhower would be in outer space. There is still something called the Republican Party, but it long ago abandoned any pretence of being a normal parliamentary party. It’s in lock-step service to the very rich and the corporate sector and has a catechism that everyone has to chant in unison, kind of like the old Communist Party. The distinguished conservative commentator, one of the most respected – Norman Ornstein – describes today’s Republican Party as, in his words, “a radical insurgency – ideologically extreme, scornful of facts and compromise, dismissive of its political opposition””

Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist

a serious danger to the society, as he points out.
Quotes 2010s, 2013, Speech at DW Global Media Forum

Way , Business , Past

“They [Republicans] say, 'You're too conservative.' Was Thomas Jefferson too conservative? I'm tired of some people calling me wacky.”

Sharron Angle (1949) Former member of the Nevada Assembly from 1999 to 2007

People

“Trump won because he was forcing the media and politicians to talk about real problems facing the country, not recycling the same bromides the GOP has been pushing for the past thirty years. Those may be okay ideas for another time, but not when the country is about to be permanently transformed into a new country, know as "California" where all those zippy Republican ideas have less chance of becoming law than the wish list of the Wicca online community.”

Ann Coulter (1961) author, political commentator

2016, In Trump We Trust: E Pluribus Awesome! (2016)

Law , Communication , Idea , Problem

“There is no conservative party in Washington. There is a Democratic Party of tax-and-spend and a Republican Party of guns and butter and tax cuts, too. Washington is all accelerator, the brakes are gone.”

Patrick Buchanan (1938) American politician and commentator

2000s, Where the Right Went Wrong (2004)

“Deep State' is no conspiracy theory. There's nothing mythical about the Republican and Democratic career government workers, embedded like parasites in the bowels of the bureaucracy, the intelligence community, the military, and a like-minded media, who've risen on their hind legs to protect their turf and protest an agenda that leaves them out in the cold.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

"Elon Musk, Et al.: The Corporate Arm Of The Deep State," https://townhall.com/columnists/ilanamercer/2017/06/03/elon-musk-et-al-the-corporate-arm-of-the-deepstate-n2335618 Townhall.com, June 3, 2017
2010s, 2017

Intelligence , Communication

“The great crisis facing the country was the rebellion and anybody in the North who wanted to preserve the Union now found the principal enemy to be those Southern slave owners who had broken up the country. The institution which sustained them and the institution they went to war to defend was slavery. And more and more northerners became convinced of that. As a consequence, a lot of them went the whole way over, from being conservative, pro-Southern, pro-slavery Democrats to becoming radical Republicans. Benjamin Butler is a good example, and Edwin M. Stanton is another one.”

James M. McPherson (1936) American historian

1990s, An Exchange With a Civil War Historian (June 1995)

War , Way , Country

“The Republican establishment has decided they don't want any part of conservatism, and this is really not new. People surprise to hear this. But the republican party formative event of conservativism is Goldwater's landslide defeat. That's what they think of when they think "conservative". They don't think Reagan. They think Goldwater. They believe what the inside-the-Beltway philosophy is about conservatives: they're racist, sexist, bigot, homophobe, Southern hayseed hicks. They're pro-lifers, they're embarrassing to have to go to convention with them, and they're just embarrassed to have those kind of people in the party.”

Rush Limbaugh (1951) U.S. radio talk show host, Commentator, author, and television personality

People , Thinking , Parting

“Right after liberal Democrats, the most dangerous politicians are country club Republicans.”

Thomas Sowell (1930) American economist, social theorist, political philosopher and author

Random Thoughts http://townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2008/08/26/random_thoughts?page=full&comments=true, 26 August 2008.
2000s

Country

“The majority of Republicans are not conservative.”

Dennis Prager (1948) American writer, speaker, radio and TV commentator, theologian

Source: 2010s, The Scariest Reason Trump Won (2016)

“(Televison) Spokesmen for the right wing of the Republican Party are tying to associate the Democrats with a so-called feminist agenda…that causes women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism, and become lesbians. (Sylvia) Heavy schedule.”

Nicole Hollander (1939) Cartoonist

Source: Sylvia cartoon strip, p. 55

Women , Children

“I say to my students, I say to my own children, I say to myself, uh the most abject form of slavery there is, is slavery to one's own feelings or passions or desires. The goal, the project of living a human life, a truly human life, is all about self-mastering. Now, if people live in a culture that encourages them to be masters of themselves and if they become masters of themselves, if they're able to control their own passions, no one's going to be perfect, we're not going to eliminate sin from the world or from the human heart, but if we're able to be masters of ourselves, masters of our own passions, then we will be able as a people to govern ourselves, we can genuinely make the republican experiment in ordered liberty work. But if we, if we lose it at the personal level, there's no way it's going to work at the societal level.”

Robert P. George (1955) American legal scholar

2016, Interview with Bill Kristol (2016)

Life , Children , People , World

“Stuart: Will you explain to me what these lesbian and gay groups are doing in bed with conservative Republicans?
Lois: Getting reamed. But they seem to like it.”

Alison Bechdel book Dykes to Watch Out For

#301, "Buyer's Remorse" (1998), collected in Post-DTWOF (2000).
Dykes to Watch Out For

“Over the last 30 odd years, Democrats have moved to the right and the right has moved into a mental hospital. So what we have is one perfectly good party for hedge fund managers, credit card companies, banks, defense contractors, big agriculture and the pharmaceutical lobby… That's the Democrats. And they sit across the aisle from a small group of religious lunatics, flat-earthers and civil war re-enactors who mostly communicate by AM radio and call themselves the Republicans and who actually worry that Obama is a socialist. Socialist? He's not even a liberal.”

Bill Maher (1956) American stand-up comedian

"From Elites to Jesus" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0sNJhphi7U
Real Time with Bill Maher

War , Communication

“Generations of Americans will pay the Republican campaign debt to the energy industry with global instability, depleted national coffers and increased vulnerability to price shocks in the oil market. They will also pay with reduced prosperity and quality of life at home. Pollution from power plants and traffic smog will continue to skyrocket. Carbon-dioxide emissions will aggravate global warming. Acid rain from Midwestern coal plants has already sterilized half the lakes in the Adirondacks and destroyed the forest cover in the high peaks of the Appalachian range up into Canada. The administration's attacks on science and the law have put something even greater at risk. Americans need to recognize that we are facing not just a threat to our environment but to our values, and to our democracy.”

Robert Francis Kennedy, Jr. (1954) American activist

In "Crimes against nature" in Rolling Stone magazine (11 December 2003).

Life , Law , Democracy , Home

“A third-party candidate is never treated equally. They look at you as a novelty, as cannon fodder. "This is entertaining," they think, "but we'll go back to the Democrats and Republicans, because only they can run our government."”

Jesse Ventura (1951) American politician and former professional wrestler

Which is baloney.
Harvard interview (February 2004)

Thinking

“I hope I speak for Deplorables when I say this: The only time you want the president to reach across the aisle on matters immigration is to grab a Democrat or an errant Republican by the throat.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

"Ice Agents Prefer Deporting Illegals To Changing Their Diapers" http://dailycaller.com/2017/03/02/ice-agents-like-deporting-illegals-better-than-changing-their-diapers/ The Daily Caller, March 3, 2017
2010s, 2017

Hope , Time

“The Mao quote is one I picked up from the late Republican strategist Lee Atwater from something I read in the late 1980s, so I hope I don't get my progressive friends mad at me. The use of the phrase 'favorite political philosophers' was intended as irony, but clearly the effort fell flat -- at least with a certain Fox commentator whose sense of irony may be missing.”

Anita Dunn (1958) American political strategist

CNN interview, October 16, 2009. http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/10/16/beck.dunn/index.html

Hope , Quotes , Sense , Effort

“Now, I know this is a bitter pill to swallow. Iraq was going to be your great legacy. Now, it's just your legacy. It didn't have to end up this way.
This week, when Republicans and conservative Democrats started jumping ship, you lashed out at them. You thought the most damning thing you could say to them was that they were "endorsing the policy positions of Michael Moore and the extreme liberal wing of the Democratic party." I mean, is that the best you can do to persuade them to stick with you — compare them to me? You gotta come up with a better villain. For heaven's sakes, you had a hundred-plus million other Americans who think the same way I do — and you could have picked on any one of them! But hey, why not cut out the name-calling and the smearing and just do the obvious thing: Come join the majority! Be one of us, your fellow Americans! Is it really that hard? Is there really any other choice? George, take a walk on the wild side!”

Michael Moore (1954) American filmmaker, author, social critic, and liberal activist

2005

Way , Thinking

“Religion is for Machiavelli utterly necessary to found, preserve, and reform good political orders. He stated this view in the most unequivocal manner. At the same time he knew very well that the only available religion was the Christian. Had he believed and argued that Christian religion was in its essence and hopelessly inimical to good political orders and above all to republican liberty he would have been compelled to also believe and argue that good political orders and republican liberty were impossible for the moderns in general and for the Italians in particular, a conclusion that he never entertained. Instead, he believed in, and suggested, the possibility of a civic interpretation of Christianity similar to the one that he knew existed in his Florence.”

Maurizio Viroli (1952) Italian essayist and philosopher

Preface
Machiavelli’s God (2011)

Religion , Time

“The Republicans had fielded an army and navy of more than 2.5 million men, had invented national banking, currency, and taxation, had provided schools and homes for poor Americans, and had freed the country's four million slaves.”

Heather Cox Richardson American historian

To Make Men Free: A History of the Republican Party https://books.google.com/books?id=s-JzAgAAQBAJ&pg=PP2&dq=to+make+men+free+a+history&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CCIQ6AEwAWoVChMIq97csor9xwIVRJkeCh3tvg7i#v=onepage&q=to%20make%20men%20free%20a%20history&f=false (2014), p. ix

Men , School , Home , Country

“All the glory and the valor and the splendor of a royal world are about to become commonplace and tawdry. All the nasty, mean things-republicanism, democracy, equality-are crawling into the light and claiming that they can replace a lineage of great kings. We are seeing the end of history, Sharpe, and the beginnings of chaos, but maybe, just maybe, King Ferdinand's household guard can bring the curtain down with one last act of shining glory.”

Bernard Cornwell (1944) British writer

Lord Kiely, p. 89
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Battle (1995)

World , Democracy , History , Light

“The Republican Party was organized in 1854-55, upon the platform of liberty and independence, to maintain the union of the States and the rights of the States; freedom of speech and the press; to resist the spread of slavery and the aggressions of the slave power; the equal rights of all persona to impartial protection at home and abroad, and in the enjoyment of religious freedom; and of all American citizens, whether native or naturalized, to the free exercise of the elective franchise and the enjoyment of its benefits; and requiring no test for office except honesty, capacity, and devotion to American institutions.”

Elbridge G. Spaulding (1809–1897) American politician

Remarks on the Republican platform (1860)

Exercises , Home , Nature , Freedom

“I happen to think that the world kind of looks down on Republicans for their social conservative views which include religion in government. I think that that should not play a role in any of this.”

Gary Johnson (1953) American politician, businessman, and 29th Governor of New Mexico

Statement made to representatives of the Pagan Newswire Collective (PNC)
2011-10-16
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/paganswithdisabilities/2011/10/full-transcript-of-qa-with-presidential-candidate-gary-johnson/
2012-02-24
2011

World , Religion , Thinking

“[F]or more than three years this Congress, which has been given the name “The Do-Nothing Congress,” has turned a blind eye to the intractable war in Iraq, ignoring the Administration’s many mistakes, allowing it to stay a failed course. Here we are with six days left in the 109th Congress, and the Republicans, which control the House and the Senate and the White House, have not held one hearing, not one, into the President’s wartime failures.”

Harry Reid (1939) American politician

"Reid: America Deserves Accountability for Iraq Contracting Abuses" http://democrats.senate.gov/newsroom/record.cfm?id=263222&, Senate Democratic Caucus website, September 18, 2006 (accessed 2006-09-21)

War , Failure , Housing

“A majority of Republican caucusgoers are white, native-born and believe that electing a demagogue will make American white again.”

Timothy Egan (1954) American writer

How Stupid Is Iowa? (2016)

“Look, the New Democrat approach, from my point of view, didn't work. That governing approach didn't stop the progression that led us to a thoroughly Republican House and now Senate, and a national debate that doesn't even address the real issues. The economic crisis of today — the only parallel is the Great Depression. That's just a fact. The difference is, there's no light at the end of the tunnel now.”

Bill de Blasio (1961) American politician and mayor of New York City

quoted by Mark Binelli of Rolling Stone http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/mayor-bill-de-blasios-crusade-20150506.

Light , Housing

“Senator Barkley and I will win this election and make these Republicans like it — don't forget that! We will do that because they are wrong and we are right, and I will prove it to you in just a few minutes.”

Harry Truman (1884–1972) American politician, 33rd president of the United States (in office from 1945 to 1953)

Address to the Democratic National Convention (15 July 1948) http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/presidents/33_truman/psources/ps_convention48.html; this has often been paraphrased as: "They are wrong and we are right and I'm going to prove it to you!"

Forgetting

“Republicanism is so meaningless a political identity that a Democrat can just as easily transition to being one, without too much pain.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

"Bruce Jenner and Chris Kyle: is either a hero?" http://www.wnd.com/2015/04/bruce-jenner-and-chris-kyle-is-either-a-hero/ WorldNetDaily.com, April 30, 2015
2010s, 2015

Pain

“Since 2003, the politics of war have been characterized by partisanship as the Republican and Democratic parties struggled for power in Washington. National efforts to date have been corrupted by partisan politics that have prevented us from devising effective, executable, supportable solutions. At times, these partisan struggles have led to political decisions that endangered the lives of our sons and daughters on the battlefield. The unmistakable message was that political power had a greater priority than our national security objectives. Overcoming this strategic failure is the first step toward achieving victory in Iraq — without bipartisan cooperation we are doomed to fail. There is nothing going on in Washington that would give us hope.”

Ricardo Sanchez (1953) United States Army Lieutenant General

Reporters and editors luncheon address (2007)

War , Hope , Failure , Support

“[B]y what inattention these scurrilously racist Republicans installed the first African-American secretary of state and national security advisor, appointed a black Supreme Court justice, elected the first black U. S. senator since Reconstruction, and sent the troops into Little Rock.”

Allen C. Guelzo (1953) American historian

2010s, Letter (2010)

Justice

“Now it's absolutely true, and I agree with Professor DiLorenzo, that the Republican Party could never have been successful without the support of the tariff interests involved. The Free Soil Party and the Liberty Party were anti-slavery parties, which were, you might say, pure in their principles, but they had no chance of being successful on a national basis. It was the addition of the tariff interests that gave the Republicans the ability to carry their anti-slavery program into action. And it’s in that light, I think, that you have to look at the whole question of the tariffs.”

Harry V. Jaffa (1918–2015) American historian and collegiate professor

2000s, The Real Abraham Lincoln: A Debate (2002), Rebuttal

Question , Support , Thinking , Light

“I can’t think of anything more crucial than real Republicans taking back the GOP.”

Gloria Steinem (1934) American feminist and journalist

The Humanist interview (2012)
Context: This war against women started a long time ago with old Democrats who took over the Republican Party, which was, before that, the very first to support the Equal Rights Amendment. Even when the National Women’s Political Caucus started, there was a whole Republican feminist entity. But beginning with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, right-wing Democrats like Jesse Helms began to leave the Democratic Party and gradually take over the GOP.
So I always feel I have to apologize to my friends who are Republicans because they’ve basically lost their party. Ronald Reagan couldn’t get nominated today because he was supportive of immigrant rights. Barry Goldwater was pro-choice. George H. W. Bush supported Planned Parenthood. No previous Republicans except for George W. Bush would be acceptable to the people who now run the GOP. They are not Republicans. They are the American version of the Taliban. … They’ve taken over one of our two great parties. This causes people to wrongly think that the country is equally divided but if we look at the public opinion polls, it isn’t. So, I can’t think of anything more crucial than real Republicans taking back the GOP.

Thinking

“I am a little to the right of … Why is the Attila comparison used? Fifth-century Hunnish depredations on the Roman Empire were the work of an overpowerful executive pursuing a policy of economic redistribution in an atmosphere of permissive social mores. I am a little to the right of Rush Limbaugh. I'm so conservative that I approve of San Francisco City Hall marriages, adoption by same-sex couples, and New Hampshire's recently ordained Episcopal bishop. Gays want to get married, have children, and go to church. Next they'll be advocating school vouchers, boycotting HBO, and voting Republican.”

P. J. O'Rourke (1947) American journalist

"I Agree With Me" (July/August 2004)

Marriage , Children , School , Sex

“The number of American presidential candidates varies with the sunspot cycle and the phases of the moon. Being a Republican, I'm backing Hillary Clinton. Because she could lose. The reason is not that she's a woman. The reason is that she's the particular woman who taught the 4th grade class that every man in America wished he were dead in. Hillary Clinton is Lucy holding the football for Charlie Brown. Hillary Clinton is 'America's ex-wife.”

P. J. O'Rourke (1947) American journalist

"Letter to Our European Friends" (4 February 2008)

Football , Dead

“Like such titles as Christian and Quaker, "anarchist" was in the end proudly adopted by one of those against whom it had been used in condemnation. In 1840, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, that stormy, argumentative individualist who prided himself on being a man of paradox and a provoker of contradiction, published the work that established him as a pioneer libertarian thinker. It was What Is Property?, in which he gave his own question the celebrated answer: "Property is theft." In the same book he became the first man willingly to claim the title of anarchist.
Undoubtedly Proudhon did this partly in defiance, and partly in order to exploit the word's paradoxical qualities. He had recognized the ambiguity of the Greek anarchos, and had gone back to it for that very reason — to emphasize that the criticism of authority on which he was about to embark need not necessarily imply an advocacy of disorder. The passages in which he introduces "anarchist" and "anarchy" are historically important enough to merit quotation, since they not merely show these words being used for the first time in a socially positive sense, but also contain in germ the justification by natural law which anarchists have in general applied to their arguments for a non-authoritarian society.
What is to be the form of government in the future? … I hear some of my readers reply: "Why, how can you ask such a question? You — are a republican." A republican! Yes, but that word specifies nothing. Res publico; that is, the public thing. Now, whoever is interested in public affairs — no matter under what form of government, may call himself a republican. Even kings are republicans. "Well, you are a democrat." No … "Then what are you?"”

George Woodcock (1912–1995) Canadian writer of political biography and history, an anarchist thinker, an essayist and literary critic

I am an anarchist!
Prologue
Anarchism : A History of Libertarian Ideas and Movements (1962)

Books , Law , Question , Nature

“The principles and position of the present administration of the United States the republican party present some puzzling questions. While”

Alexander H. Stephens (1812–1883) Vice President of the Confederate States (in office from 1861 to 1865)

The Cornerstone Speech (1861)
Context: The surest way to secure peace, is to show your ability to maintain your rights. The principles and position of the present administration of the United States the republican party present some puzzling questions. While it is a fixed principle with them never to allow the increase of a foot of slave territory, they seem to be equally determined not to part with an inch 'of the accursed soil. Notwithstanding their clamor against the institution, they seemed to be equally opposed to getting more, or letting go what they have got. They were ready to fight on the accession of Texas, and are equally ready to fight now on her secession. Why is this? How can this strange paradox be accounted for? There seems to be but one rational solution and that is, notwithstanding their professions of humanity, they are disinclined to give up the benefits they derive from slave labor. Their philanthropy yields to their interest. The idea of enforcing the laws, has but one object, and that is a collection of the taxes, raised by slave labor to swell the fund necessary to meet their heavy appropriations. The spoils is what they are after though they come from the labor of the slave

Question

“I should say this — that Pat doesn't have a mink coat. But she does have a respectable Republican cloth coat. And I always tell her that she'd look good in anything.”

Richard Nixon (1913–1994) 37th President of the United States of America

1950s, Checkers speech (1952)
Context: p>That's what we have and that's what we owe. It isn't very much but Pat and I have the satisfaction that every dime that we've got is honestly ours. I should say this — that Pat doesn't have a mink coat. But she does have a respectable Republican cloth coat. And I always tell her that she'd look good in anything.One other thing I probably should tell you because if we don't they'll probably be saying this about me too, we did get something — a gift — after the election. A man down in Texas heard Pat on the radio mention the fact that our two youngsters would like to have a dog. And, believe it or not, the day before we left on this campaign trip we got a message from Union Station in Baltimore saying they had a package for us. We went down to get it. You know what it was. It was a little cocker spaniel dog in a crate that he'd sent all the way from Texas. Black and white spotted. And our little girl — Tricia, the 6-year old — named it Checkers. And you know, the kids, like all kids, love the dog and I just want to say this right now, that regardless of what they say about it, we're gonna keep it.</p

Clothes

“Democratic leaders had been telling their Irish-American constituents that the wicked Black Republicans were waging the war to free the slaves who would come north and take away the jobs”

James M. McPherson (1936) American historian

James M. McPherson. Drawn with the Sword : Reflections on the American Civil War] (1996), Princeton University: Oxford University Press. pp. 91–92
1990s
Context: Rioters were mostly Irish Catholic immigrants and their children. They mainly attacked the members of New York's small black population. For a year, Democratic leaders had been telling their Irish-American constituents that the wicked Black Republicans were waging the war to free the slaves who would come north and take away the jobs of Irish workers. The use of black stevedores as scabs in a recent strike by Irish dockworkers made this charge seem plausible. The prospect of being drafted to fight to free the slaves made the Irish even more receptive to demogogic rhetoric.

War

“The Democrats are the party that says government will make you smarter, taller, richer, and remove the crabgrass on your lawn. Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work, and then they get elected and prove it.”

P. J. O'Rourke book Parliament of Whores

Parliament of Whores (1991)

“That is, some did, way back in when decent republicans and democrats shared one aim — to negotiate better solutions for the republic.”

David Brin (1950) novelist, short story writer

A rant about stupidity... and the coming civil war... (2009)
Context: I've long felt that the best minds of the right had useful things to contribute to a national conversation — even if their overall habit of resistance to change proved wrongheaded, more often than right. At least, some of them had the beneficial knack of targeting and criticizing the worst liberal mistakes, and often forcing needful re-drafting.
That is, some did, way back in when decent republicans and democrats shared one aim — to negotiate better solutions for the republic.
Alas, today's Republican Establishment seems not only incapable but uninterested in negotiation or deliberation. It isn't just the dogmatism, or lockstep partisanship, or Koolaid fantasies spun-up by the Murdoch-Limbaugh hate machine. Heck, even though "culture war" is verifiably the worst direct treason against the United States of America since Fort Sumter, that isn't what boggles most.
It's the stupidity. The vast and nearly uniform dumbitudinousness of ignoring what has happened to conservatism, a transformation of nearly all of the salient traits of Barry Goldwater from:

Way

“We want them to be Republican because of what we mean to do for the United States of America”

Warren G. Harding (1865–1923) American politician, 29th president of the United States (in office from 1921 to 1923)

1920s, Nationalism and Americanism (1920)
Context: The misfortune is not alone that it rends the concord of nations. The greater pity is that it rends the concord of our citizenship at home. It's folly to think of blending Greek and Bulgar, Italian and Slovak, or making any of them rejoicingly American, when the land of adoption sits in judgement on the land from which he came. We need to be rescued from divisionary and fruitless pursuit of peace through super government. I do not want Americans of foreign birth making their party alignments on what we mean to do for some nation in the old world. We want them to be Republican because of what we mean to do for the United States of America. Our call is for unison, not rivaling sympathies. Our need is concord, not the antipathies of long inheritance.

“It was incumbent on us then to try this remedy, and with that view to frame a republican system on such a scale & in such a form as will controul all the evils wch. have been experienced.”

James Madison (1751–1836) 4th president of the United States (1809 to 1817)

Madison's own notes on Madison's remarks of debate (6 June 1787) http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/debates_606.asp
1780s, The Debates in the Federal Convention (1787)
Context: In all cases where a majority are united by a common interest or passion, the rights of the minority are in danger. What motives are to restrain them? A prudent regard to the maxim that honesty is the best policy is found by experience to be as little regarded by bodies of men as by individuals. Respect for character is always diminished in proportion to the number among whom the blame or praise is to be divided. Conscience, the only remaining tie, is known to be inadequate in individuals: In large numbers, little is to be expected from it. Besides, Religion itself may become a motive to persecution & oppression. — These observations are verified by the Histories of every Country antient & modern. In Greece & Rome the rich & poor, the creditors & debtors, as well as the patricians & plebians alternately oppressed each other with equal unmercifulness. What a source of oppression was the relation between the parent cities of Rome, Athens & Carthage, & their respective provinces: the former possessing the power, & the latter being sufficiently distinguished to be separate objects of it? Why was America so justly apprehensive of Parliamentary injustice? Because G. Britain had a separate interest real or supposed, & if her authority had been admitted, could have pursued that interest at our expence. We have seen the mere distinction of colour made in the most enlightened period of time, a ground of the most oppressive dominion ever exercised by man over man. What has been the source of those unjust laws complained of among ourselves? Has it not been the real or supposed interest of the major number? Debtors have defrauded their creditors. The landed interest has borne hard on the mercantile interest. The Holders of one species of property have thrown a disproportion of taxes on the holders of another species. The lesson we are to draw from the whole is that where a majority are united by a common sentiment, and have an opportunity, the rights of the minor party become insecure. In a Republican Govt. the Majority if united have always an opportunity. The only remedy is to enlarge the sphere, & thereby divide the community into so great a number of interests & parties, that in the 1st. place a majority will not be likely at the same moment to have a common interest separate from that of the whole or of the minority; and in the 2d. place, that in case they shd. have such an interest, they may not be apt to unite in the pursuit of it. It was incumbent on us then to try this remedy, and with that view to frame a republican system on such a scale & in such a form as will controul all the evils wch. have been experienced.

Evil

“Instead of the world being divided up into Catholics and Protestants or Republicans and Democrats or white men and black men or even men and women, I saw the world divided into people who had slept with somebody and people who hadn't, and this seemed the only really significant difference between one person and another.”

Sylvia Plath book The Bell Jar

Source: The Bell Jar (1963), Ch. 7
Context: Instead of the world being divided up into Catholics and Protestants or Republicans and Democrats or white men and black men or even men and women, I saw the world divided into people who had slept with somebody and people who hadn't, and this seemed the only really significant difference between one person and another. I thought a spectacular change would come over me the day I crossed the boundary line.

Women , Men , People , World

“The difference between American parties is actually simple. Democrats are in favor of higher taxes to pay for greater spending, while Republicans are in favor of greater spending, for which the taxpayers will pay. In foreign policy, Republicans intend to pursue the war in Iraq but to do so with a minimal number of troops on the ground. This is not to be confused with the disastrous Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld policy of using a minimal number of troops on the ground to pursue the war in Iraq. Democrats intend to end the war, but they don't know when. Democrats are making the 'high school sex promise': I'll pull out in time, honest!”

P. J. O'Rourke (1947) American journalist

"Letter to Our European Friends" (4 February 2008)

War , School , Sex , Time

“This is the demise of the Republican Party. This is an opportunity, I think, for the Libertarian Party to become a major party.”

Gary Johnson (1953) American politician, businessman, and 29th Governor of New Mexico

2016, Interview with CNBC's John Harwood (August 22, 2016)

“I always feel I have to apologize to my friends who are Republicans because they’ve basically lost their party.”

Gloria Steinem (1934) American feminist and journalist

The Humanist interview (2012)
Context: This war against women started a long time ago with old Democrats who took over the Republican Party, which was, before that, the very first to support the Equal Rights Amendment. Even when the National Women’s Political Caucus started, there was a whole Republican feminist entity. But beginning with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, right-wing Democrats like Jesse Helms began to leave the Democratic Party and gradually take over the GOP.
So I always feel I have to apologize to my friends who are Republicans because they’ve basically lost their party. Ronald Reagan couldn’t get nominated today because he was supportive of immigrant rights. Barry Goldwater was pro-choice. George H. W. Bush supported Planned Parenthood. No previous Republicans except for George W. Bush would be acceptable to the people who now run the GOP. They are not Republicans. They are the American version of the Taliban. … They’ve taken over one of our two great parties. This causes people to wrongly think that the country is equally divided but if we look at the public opinion polls, it isn’t. So, I can’t think of anything more crucial than real Republicans taking back the GOP.

Feeling

“Independence was an act of revolution; republicanism was something new under the sun; the federal system was a vast experimental laboratory.”

Henry Steele Commager (1902–1998) American historian

Who is Loyal to America? (1947)
Context: Independence was an act of revolution; republicanism was something new under the sun; the federal system was a vast experimental laboratory. Physically Americans were pioneers; in the realm of social and economic institutions, too, their tradition has been one of pioneering. From the beginning, intellectual and spiritual diversity have been as characteristic of America as racial and linguistic. The most distinctively American philosophies have been transcendentalism — which is the philosophy of the Higher Law and pragmatism — which is the philosophy of experimentation and pluralism. These two principles are the very core of Americanism: the principle of the Higher Law, or of obedience to the dictates of conscience rather than of statutes, and the principle of pragmatism, or the rejection of a single good and of the notion of a finished universe. From the beginning Americans have known that there were new worlds to conquer, new truths to be discovered. Every effort to confine Americanism to a single pattern, to constrain it to a single formula, is disloyalty to everything that is valid in Americanism.

Sun

“The true foundation of republican government is the equal right of every citizen, in his person and property, and in their management.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

1810s, Letter to H. Tompkinson (AKA Samuel Kercheval) (1816)
Context: The true foundation of republican government is the equal right of every citizen, in his person and property, and in their management. Try by this, as a tally, every provision of our constitution, and see if it hangs directly on the will of the people. Reduce your legislature to a convenient number for full, but orderly discussion. Let every man who fights or pays, exercise his just and equal right in their election.

Personality

“To the American people of 1789, their nation promised a new way of life: each individual a free man; each having the right to seek his own happiness; a republican form of government in which the people would be sovereign; and no arbitrary power over people's lives.”

Charles A. Reich book The Greening of America

Source: The Greening of America (1970), Chapter II : Consciousness I: Loss Of Reality, p. 21 (See also: Hunter S. Thompson)
Context: To the American people of 1789, their nation promised a new way of life: each individual a free man; each having the right to seek his own happiness; a republican form of government in which the people would be sovereign; and no arbitrary power over people's lives. Less than two hundred years later, almost every aspect of the dream has been lost.

Life , People , Way , Happiness

“No previous Republicans except for George W. Bush would be acceptable to the people who now run the GOP. They are not Republicans. They are the American version of the Taliban.”

Gloria Steinem (1934) American feminist and journalist

The Humanist interview (2012)
Context: This war against women started a long time ago with old Democrats who took over the Republican Party, which was, before that, the very first to support the Equal Rights Amendment. Even when the National Women’s Political Caucus started, there was a whole Republican feminist entity. But beginning with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, right-wing Democrats like Jesse Helms began to leave the Democratic Party and gradually take over the GOP.
So I always feel I have to apologize to my friends who are Republicans because they’ve basically lost their party. Ronald Reagan couldn’t get nominated today because he was supportive of immigrant rights. Barry Goldwater was pro-choice. George H. W. Bush supported Planned Parenthood. No previous Republicans except for George W. Bush would be acceptable to the people who now run the GOP. They are not Republicans. They are the American version of the Taliban. … They’ve taken over one of our two great parties. This causes people to wrongly think that the country is equally divided but if we look at the public opinion polls, it isn’t. So, I can’t think of anything more crucial than real Republicans taking back the GOP.

People

“What got Van Jones fired was they caught him on tape saying that Republicans are assholes. And they call it "news." And Obama didn't say a word in defense of Jones and basically fired him when Glenn Beck told him to.”

Bill Maher (1956) American stand-up comedian

New Rule: Float Like Obama, Sting Like Ali (2009)
Context: What got Van Jones fired was they caught him on tape saying that Republicans are assholes. And they call it "news." And Obama didn't say a word in defense of Jones and basically fired him when Glenn Beck told him to. Just like we dropped "end of life counseling" from health care reform because Sarah Palin said it meant "death panels" on her Facebook page.
Crazy evil morons make up things for Obama to do, and he does it.

“Being desirous of allaying the dissensions of party strife now existing within our realm, I do hereby dissolve and abolish the Democratic and Republican parties”

Emperor Norton (1811–1880) Self-proclaimed Emperor of the United States

"Imperial Decree" dated 12th Day of August 1869, published in The San Francisco Herald (13 August 1869)
Context: Being desirous of allaying the dissensions of party strife now existing within our realm, I do hereby dissolve and abolish the Democratic and Republican parties, and also do hereby decree the disfranchisement and imprisonment, for not more than 10, nor less than five, years, to all persons leading to any violation of this our imperial decree.

“The Republican Party has been captured by a bunch of extremists … People who maintain that markets will take care of everything, that you leave it to the markets and the markets know best. Therefore, you need no government, no interference with business.”

George Soros (1930) Hungarian-American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist

Interview with David Brancaccio (2003)
Context: The Republican Party has been captured by a bunch of extremists … People who maintain that markets will take care of everything, that you leave it to the markets and the markets know best. Therefore, you need no government, no interference with business. Let everybody pursue his own interests. And that will serve the common interest. Now, there is a good foundation for this. But it's a half-truth.

People , Business

“The framers of our Constitution firmly believed that a republican government could not endure without intelligence and education generally diffused among the people.”

Ulysses S. Grant (1822–1885) 18th President of the United States

1870s, Message to the Senate and House of Representatives (1870)
Context: The framers of our Constitution firmly believed that a republican government could not endure without intelligence and education generally diffused among the people. The Father of his Country, in his Farewell Address, uses this language: Promote, then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened.

People , Education , Intelligence

“The mother principle [is] that 'governments are republican only in proportion as they embody the will of their people, and execute it.'.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

1810s, Letter to H. Tompkinson (AKA Samuel Kercheval) (1816)

People

“Those rules divide the world into Democrats & Republicans, liberals & conservatives, and allow journalists to pretend they have done their job if instead of reporting the truth behind the news, they merely give each side an opportunity to spin the news.”

Bill Moyers (1934) American journalist

Speech at the National Conference on Media Reform (15 May 2005) http://www.freepress.net/news/8120
Context: A free press is one where it's okay to state the conclusion you're led to by the evidence. One reason I'm in hot water is because my colleagues and I at NOW didn't play by the conventional rules of Beltway journalism. Those rules divide the world into Democrats & Republicans, liberals & conservatives, and allow journalists to pretend they have done their job if instead of reporting the truth behind the news, they merely give each side an opportunity to spin the news.

Truth , World

“As a lifelong Republican who served in the Army in Germany, I believe it is critical that we review — and overturn — the ban on gay service in the military.”

Alan Simpson (1931) American politician

"Bigotry That Hurts Our Military" in The Washington Post (14 May 2007) http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/13/AR2007031301507.html.
Context: As a lifelong Republican who served in the Army in Germany, I believe it is critical that we review — and overturn — the ban on gay service in the military. I voted for "don't ask, don't tell." But much has changed since 1993.
My thinking shifted when I read that the military was firing translators because they are gay. According to the Government Accountability Office, more than 300 language experts have been fired under "don't ask, don't tell," including more than 50 who are fluent in Arabic. This when even Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice recently acknowledged the nation's "foreign language deficit" and how much our government needs Farsi and Arabic speakers. Is there a "straight" way to translate Arabic? Is there a "gay" Farsi? My God, we'd better start talking sense before it is too late. We need every able-bodied, smart patriot to help us win this war.

“In the first place, I say that the North hates slavery, and, in using that expression I speak wittingly. In saying that the Black Republican party of the North hates slavery, I speak intentionally.”

Henry L. Benning (1814–1875) Confederate Army general

Speech to the Virginia Convention (1861)
Context: In the first place, I say that the North hates slavery, and, in using that expression I speak wittingly. In saying that the Black Republican party of the North hates slavery, I speak intentionally. If there is a doubt upon that question in the mind of any one who listens to me, a few of the multitude of proofs which could fill this room, would, I think, be sufficient to satisfy him. I beg to refer to a few of the proofs that are so abundant; and the first that I shall adduce consists in two extracts from a speech of Lincoln's, made in October 1858. They are as follows: 'I have always hated slavery as much as any abolitionist; I have always been an old line Whig; I have always hated it and I always believed it in the course of ultimate extinction, and if I were in Congress and a vote should come up on the question, whether slavery should be excluded from the territory, in spite of the Dred Scott decision, I would vote that it should.

Hate

“The Democrats complain about the Republican base being nuts … The nuts are their entire party”

Ann Coulter (1961) author, political commentator

Comments at the University of Florida (21 October 2005), as quoted in "Coulter courts Gainesville" by Jessica Riffel, in The Alligator (21 October 2005) http://www.alligator.org/pt2/051021coulter.php.
2005
Context: The Democrats complain about the Republican base being nuts … The nuts are their entire party … They're always accusing us of repressing their speech. I say let's do it. Let's repress them. … Frankly, I'm not a big fan of the First Amendment.

“Coulter could be the poster woman for the most extreme side of the Republican Party. And in some ways I could be the poster woman for the opposite.”

Meghan McCain (1984) Daughter of United States Senator John McCain

"My Beef With Ann Coulter" in The Daily Beast (9 March 2009) http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-03-09/my-beef-with-ann-coulter/
Context: Certain individuals continue to perpetuate negative stereotypes about Republicans. Especially Republican women. Who do I feel is the biggest culprit? Ann Coulter. I straight up don’t understand this woman or her popularity. I find her offensive, radical, insulting, and confusing all at the same time. But no matter how much you or I disagree with her, the cult that follows Coulter cannot be denied. She is a New York Times best-selling author and one of the most notable female members of the Republican Party. She was one of the headliners at the recent CPAC conference (but when your competition is a teenager who has a dream about the Republican Party and Stephen Baldwin, it’s not really saying that much).
Coulter could be the poster woman for the most extreme side of the Republican Party. And in some ways I could be the poster woman for the opposite. I consider myself a progressive Republican, but here is what I don’t get about Coulter: Is she for real or not? Are some of her statements just gimmicks to gain publicity for her books or does she actually believe the things she says? Does she really believe all Jewish people should be “perfected” and become Christians? And what was she thinking when she said Hillary Clinton was more conservative than my father during the last election? If you truly have the GOP’s best interests at heart, how can you possibly justify telling an audience of millions that a Democrat would be a better leader than the Republican presidential candidate? (I asked Ann for comment on this column, including many of the above questions, but she did not answer my request.)

Way

“Among the fundamental likeness between the Revolutionary Republicans and the Anarchists is the recognition that the little must precede the great; that the local must be the basis of the general; that there can be a free federation only when there are free communities to federate”

Voltairine de Cleyre (1866–1912) American anarchist writer and feminist

Anarchism & American Traditions (1908)
Context: Among the fundamental likeness between the Revolutionary Republicans and the Anarchists is the recognition that the little must precede the great; that the local must be the basis of the general; that there can be a free federation only when there are free communities to federate; that the spirit of the latter is carried into the councils of the former, and a local tyranny may thus become an instrument for general enslavement. Convinced of the supreme importance of ridding the municipalities of the institutions of tyranny, the most strenuous advocates of independence, instead of spending their efforts mainly in the general Congress, devoted themselves to their home localities, endeavoring to work out of the minds of their neighbors and fellow-colonists the institutions of entailed property, of a State-Church, of a class-divided people, even the institution of African slavery itself. Though largely unsuccessful, it is to the measure of success they did achieve that we are indebted for such liberties as we do retain, and not to the general government.

Communication

“This primitive Republicanism, which admits monarchy as an occasional incident, but holds fast to the collective supremacy of all free men, of the constituent authority over all constituted authorities, is the remote germ of parliamentary government.”

John Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton (1834–1902) British politician and historian

The History of Freedom in Christianity (1877)
Context: In the height of their power the Romans became aware of a race of men that had not abdicated freedom in the hands of a monarch; and the ablest writer of the empire pointed to them with a vague and bitter feeling that, to the institutions of these barbarians, not yet crushed by despotism, the future of the world belonged. Their kings, when they had kings, did not preside [at] their councils; they were sometimes elective; they were sometimes deposed; and they were bound by oath to act in obedience to the general wish. They enjoyed real authority only in war. This primitive Republicanism, which admits monarchy as an occasional incident, but holds fast to the collective supremacy of all free men, of the constituent authority over all constituted authorities, is the remote germ of parliamentary government.

Men

“I was always raised to think that Republicans were about limited government, about individual liberty, about fiscal responsibility, about balanced budgets, about a wariness of military adventures abroad, about responsible encouragement to business.”

John Perry Barlow (1947–2018) American poet and essayist

Planet JH Weekly interview (2005)
Context: I was always raised to think that Republicans were about limited government, about individual liberty, about fiscal responsibility, about balanced budgets, about a wariness of military adventures abroad, about responsible encouragement to business. There's a whole list of things I thought the Republican Party was all about, and these guys that presently occupy the White House, are categorically against every single one of those things. So if they're Republicans, I'm not. But I'm really not a very comfortable Democrat. I mean the Democrats in the last elections proved themselves to be a bunch of dithering pussies... and it was pathetic. So I'm just waiting until one party or the other actually gets a moral compass and a backbone.

Business , Thinking

“Watching Republicans in Washington is like watching lemmings, if lemmings jumped into cesspools instead of off cliffs. Splash! There goes Mark Foley!”

P. J. O'Rourke (1947) American journalist

"What's That Smell?" (23 October 2006)

Quotes about republican page 7

Quotes about republican
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