#politics

About 25 years ago, I started out as a reporter covering politics. And that sort of just evolved into organized crime, because organized crime and politics were the same thing in Boston. ↗

— Howie Carr

#ago #because #boston #covering #crime

But we are entitled to look for continuity in politics. ↗

— Jonathan Coe

#entitled #look #politics

Even with politics, stuff comes around again. Woody Guthrie would recognize America today. ↗

— Billy Bragg

#america #around #comes #even #guthrie

I'm still batting away on my politics for the Labour Party. I'm much further to the left of them than I used to be, but that's because they've moved, not me. ↗

— Billy Bragg

#batting #because #further #i #labour

I cry, sometimes, because I'm not 20 years younger, and I'm not healthy. But if I were, I would even sacrifice my writing to enter politics. ↗

— Oriana Fallaci

#cry #enter #even #healthy #i

The idea that religion and politics don't mix was invented by the Devil to keep Christians from running their own country. ↗

— Jerry Falwell

#country #devil #idea #invented #keep

It's very difficult to talk about religion in Iran because religion has gotten so mixed up with politics. ↗

— Asghar Farhadi

#because #difficult #gotten #iran #mixed

We read too much Shakespeare at school, and view our parliamentary politics as dynastic drama, in which an impatient crown prince frets at his long subordination and begins to scheme for the throne he knows he merits, was promised and has earned. ↗

— James Buchan

#crown #drama #earned #frets #his

The writing is all done, so it's all about verbalizing everything from point A to point B, and certainly there's a bit of politics involved, so it's a different thing. ↗

— Lindsey Buckingham

#bit #certainly #different #different thing #done

Mainly, though, the Democratic Party has become the party of reaction. In reaction to a war that is ill conceived, we appear suspicious of all military action. In reaction to those who proclaim the market can cure all ills, we resist efforts to use market principles to tackle pressing problems. In reaction to religious overreach, we equate tolerance with secularism, and forfeit the moral language that would help infuse our policies with a larger meaning. We lose elections and hope for the courts to foil Republican plans. We lost the courts and wait for a White House scandal. And increasingly we feel the need to match the Republican right in stridency and hardball tactics. The accepted wisdom that drives many advocacy groups and Democratic activists these days goes like this: The Republican Party has been able to consistently win elections not by expanding its base but by vilifying Democrats, driving wedges into the electorate, energizing its right wing, and disciplining those who stray from the party line. If the Democrats ever want to get back into power, then they will have to take up the same approach. ...Ultimately, though, I believe any attempt by Democrats to pursue a more sharply partisan and ideological strategy misapprehends the moment we're in. I am convinced that whenever we exaggerate or demonize, oversimplify or overstate our case, we lose. Whenever we dumb down the political debate, we lose. For it's precisely the pursuit of ideological purity, the rigid orthodoxy and the sheer predictability of our current political debate, that keeps us from finding new ways to meet the challenges we face as a country. It's what keeps us locked in "either/or" thinking: the notion that we can have only big government or no government; the assumption that we must either tolerate forty-six million without health insurance or embrace "socialized medicine". It is such doctrinaire thinking and stark partisanship that have turned Americans off of politics. ↗

— Barack Obama

#dreams