We have always been prepared to negotiate with the U.S. government everything that has to do with bilateral relations, on a basis of the strictest mutual respect for the sovereign rights of each country. We will never try to ask the government of the United States to change its economic and political system.

Neither sex, without some fertilization of the complimentary characters of the other, is capable of the highest reaches of human endeavor.

Love is about mutual respect, apart from attraction.

Capitalism does not permit an even flow of economic resources. With this system, a small privileged few are rich beyond conscience, and almost all others are doomed to be poor at some level. That’s the way the system works. And since we know that the system will not change the rules, we are going to have to change the system.

Let us move from the era of confrontation to the era of negotiation.

The main message we want to get out there is that climate change is caused by the rotten economic system.

You have no ability, if you’re a financial institution and you’re threatened with criminal prosecution, you have no ability to negotiate.

I won’t accept anything less than the best a player’s capable of doing… and he has the right to expect the best that I can do for him and the team!

The problem is that the U.S. government is the biggest debtor in the world, and those depending on it to take care of them will only become poorer.

You don’t want to negotiate the price of simple things you buy every day.

I don’t know a country in the world that doesn’t have borders and doesn’t want to know who is coming into their country.

Every country must be absolutely free to adopt the type of economic, political and social system that it considers convenient.

The moon and other celestial bodies should be free for exploration and use by all countries. No country should be permitted to advance a claim of sovereignty.

With impressive proof on all sides of magnificent progress, no one can rightly deny the fundamental correctness of our economic system.

I think I have a certain respect for people, you know. And I guess a lot of times I expect that respect to go both ways.

Diplomacy is listening to what the other guy needs. Preserving your own position, but listening to the other guy. You have to develop relationships with other people so when the tough times come, you can work together.

Imagine a political system so radical as to promise to move more of the poorest 20% of the population into the richest 20% than remain in the poorest bracket within the decade? You don’t need to imagine it. It’s called the United States of America.

I do believe that in order to be a successful negotiator that as a diplomat, you have to be able to put yourself into the other person’s shoes. Unless you can understand what is motivating them, you are never going to be able to figure out how to solve a particular problem.

Even peace may be purchased at too high a price.

I want to negotiate what I’m worth. I want to put my analytics forward, man-to-man, and to be like, ‚This is what I’m owed now. Pay me.‘ And then we can talk.

There’s very little dislike of Americans in the world, shown by repeated polls, and the dissatisfaction – that is, the hatred and the anger – they come from acceptance of American values, not a rejection of them, and recognition that they’re rejected by the U.S. government and by U.S. elites, which does lead to hatred and anger.

History shows that, more often than not, loss of sovereignty leads to liberalisation imposed in the interests of the powerful.

The basis of our political system is the right of the people to make and to alter their constitutions of government.

When I was elected President nobody asked me to negotiate between Israel and Egypt. It was not even a question raised in my campaign. But I felt that one of the reasons that I was elected President was to try to bring peace to the Holy Land.

Democracy as a system has evolved into something that Thomas Jefferson didn’t anticipate.

We’ve become, now, an oligarchy instead of a democracy. I think that’s been the worst damage to the basic moral and ethical standards to the American political system that I’ve ever seen in my life.

Only free men can negotiate. A prisoner cannot enter into contracts.

Socialism, reduced to its simplest legal and practical expression, means the complete discarding of the institution of private property by transforming it into public property, and the division of the resultant public income equally and indiscriminately among the entire population.

Diplomacy is the art of saying ‚Nice doggie‘ until you can find a rock.

I think business has to be stupider. I want to do really straightforward, stupid business – just talk to me like a 4-year-old. And I refuse to negotiate. I do not negotiate. I can collaborate. But I’m an artist, so as soon as you negotiate, you’re being compromised.

Our economic system, run for profit and waste and based primarily on the extractive industries, is the cause of climate change. We have wasted the earth’s treasure and we can no longer exploit it cheaply.

By what principle of original right is it that one-fiftieth or one-ninetieth of a great nation, by calling themselves a State, have the right to break up and ruin that nation as a matter of original principle?

I find capitalism repugnant. It is filthy, it is gross, it is alienating… because it causes war, hypocrisy and competition.

It’s tough to negotiate from a position of weakness.

Communism doesn’t work because people like to own stuff.

Syntax, my lad. It has been restored to the highest place in the republic.

Me and my brother get along super well. We’re, like, best friends. So we’ll stay up until, like, five just talking because we get along and, you know, it’s cool. And he respects my opinions, and I respect his, even if we don’t have the same opinions, but a lot of the time we do.

All an agent is going to do is buy things for a player, damage his eligibility, and make the player dependent on them.

Never hold discussions with the monkey when the organ grinder is in the room.

Our position is that we do not accept conditions of any kind which may affect the independence and sovereignty of our country just with the view to solve economic problems existing between the United States and Cuba.

Those who can win a war well can rarely make a good peace and those who could make a good peace would never have won the war.

I sent American troops to Iraq to make its people free, not to make them American. Iraqis will write their own history and find their own way.

I had faith in Israel before it was established, I have in it now. I believe it has a glorious future before it – not just another sovereign nation, but as an embodiment of the great ideals of our civilization.

The bargain that yields mutual satisfaction is the only one that is apt to be repeated.

If you’re a politician, you might want to learn the Buddhist way of negotiation. Restoring communication and bringing back reconciliation is clear and concrete in Buddhism.

Russia isn’t going to start a war. They can’t afford it. I think Mr. Putin can be dealt with if we stop screaming at him. You can work with the guy. You just have to know who he is.

Colonies do not cease to be colonies because they are independent.

September 11 shocked many Americans into an awareness that they had better pay much closer attention to what the U.S. government does in the world and how it is perceived. Many issues have been opened for discussion that were not on the agenda before. That’s all to the good.

The problem with car dealerships is you’ve already decided what you want to buy before you even go there, and you’re really just going there to talk through some annoying negotiation.

I remember the last three days that I was president, I never went to bed at all. I never went to bed until we had negotiated the final release of the hostages.

It isn’t enough just to scream at the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations. We need our political system to start reflect this anger back into, ‚How do we fix it? How do we get the economy going again?‘

The Chinese government wants me to say that for many centuries Tibet has been part of China. Even if I make that statement, many people would just laugh. And my statement will not change past history. History is history.

I believe mutual respect for one another and cooperation should be the basis for relationships with foreign nations.

A large majority of Americans believe that the U.N., not the U.S., should take the lead in working with Iraqis to transfer authentic sovereignty as well as in economic reconstruction and maintaining civic order.

Nobody’s ever said that pins are a tool of diplomacy.

Well, capitalism is a big problem, because with capitalism you’re just going to keep buying and selling things until there’s nothing else to buy and sell, which means gobbling up the planet.

I don’t see any possibility of Britain and the U.S. allowing a sovereign independent Iraq; that’s almost inconceivable.

To jaw-jaw is always better than to war-war.

We win justice quickest by rendering justice to the other party.

If I should ever be captured, I want no negotiation – and if I should request a negotiation from captivity they should consider that a sign of duress.

I think that both parties should declare the debt limit as a political weapon of mass destruction which can’t be used. I mean, it is silly to have a country that has 237 years building up its reputation and then have people threaten to tear it down because they’re not getting some other matter.