If the United States loses the economic weapons of control, it is very much weakened.

Even if the economy crashes, we will still burn oil.

When the external factors over which one has no control in a way start to become negative, it starts to affect our creative juices.

Immense power is acquired by assuring yourself in your secret reveries that you were born to control affairs.

Why should Iran have a deterrent strategy? Well, it’s surrounded by hostile enemies. Both of its borders have been under occupation by a hostile superpower, the United States, which is constantly violating the U.N. charter by leaving open what they call the saying, ‚all options are open‘ – meaning the threat of war.

The Soviet Union, the socialist camp, the People’s Republic of China, and North Korea helped us resist, with essential supplies and weapons, the implacable blockade of the United States, the most powerful empire ever to exist.

Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms of government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.

All modern revolutions have ended in a reinforcement of the power of the State.

Diplomacy: the art of restraining power.

Wondrous is the strength of cheerfulness, and its power of endurance – the cheerful man will do more in the same time, will do it; better, will preserve it longer, than the sad or sullen.

Politicians also have no leisure, because they are always aiming at something beyond political life itself, power and glory, or happiness.

I really like hip-hop and rap; that’s my main influence. I really wanna be more of a hip-hop artist.

Every man needs slaves like he needs clean air. To rule is to breathe, is it not? And even the most disenfranchised get to breathe. The lowest on the social scale have their spouses or their children.

How long will it take the citizens of the United States, one wonders, to recognize that the house their country bombed in Iraq is the same one they were living in until it was foreclosed?

The U.S. immigration laws are bad – really, really bad. I’d say treatment of immigrants is one of the greatest injustices done in our government’s name.

If the people are happy, united, wealthy, and powerful, we presume the rest. We conclude that to be good from whence good is derived.

We’ve persevered because of a belief we share with the Iraqi people – a belief that out of the ashes of war, a new beginning could be born in this cradle of civilization. Through this remarkable chapter in the history of the United States and Iraq, we have met our responsibility. Now, it’s time to turn the page.

My music is influenced by L.A. culture.

Our chief justices have probably had more profound and lasting influence on their times and on the direction of the nation than most presidents.

The good opinion of mankind, like the lever of Archimedes, with the given fulcrum, moves the world.

It is a well-known fact that those people who must want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it… anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.

Fidel Castro, whatever people may think of him, is a hero in Latin America, primarily because he stood up to the United States.

We have the power to make this the best generation of mankind in the history of the world or to make it the last.

Is science of any value? I think a power to do something is of value. Whether the result is a good thing or a bad thing depends on how it is used, but the power is a value.

Even people on the liberal side are starting to worry about going off a fiscal cliff.

Free government is the most difficult of all government. But it is everlastingly true that the plain people will make fewer mistakes than any other group of men, no matter how powerful.

I don’t think I ever thought of myself as Superman. But there were people who thought of me that way, and maybe I believed them a little.

Power is not alluring to pure minds.

We always live in an uncertain world. What is certain is that the United States will go forward over time.

Now, anybody who thinks that we can move this economy forward with just a few folks at the top doing well, hoping that it’s going to trickle down to working people who are running faster and faster just to keep up, you’ll never see it.

The money in politics is a cash cow for the media.

We live in a day that nobody’s lived in before: where you can touch more people. The message I’ll speak tonight and the message that I speak at home, people in India will hear. It’s just an amazing day.

Being acknowledged for your work is always a great accomplishment, whether it’s people in my city, kids in the street, all the way up to the Grammys.

Every time there has been an effort by the Haitian people to overcome the misery and poverty that comes from 200 years of bitter attacks, really bitter, the U.S. steps in and blocks it.

In the world there is nothing more submissive and weak than water. Yet for attacking that which is hard and strong nothing can surpass it.

Next to enjoying ourselves, the next greatest pleasure consists in preventing others from enjoying themselves, or, more generally, in the acquisition of power.

Power is of two kinds. One is obtained by the fear of punishment and the other by acts of love. Power based on love is a thousand times more effective and permanent then the one derived from fear of punishment.

The devil ain’t got no power over me. The devil come, and me shake hands with the devil. Devil have his part to play. Devil’s a good friend, too… because when you don’t know him, that’s the time he can mosh you down.

Power does not corrupt. Fear corrupts… perhaps the fear of a loss of power.

Bhai was my hero and he had immense influence on me.

If you think the United States has stood still, who built the largest shopping center in the world?

Britain kept its position as the dominant world power well into the 20th century despite steady decline. By the end of World War II, dominance had shifted decisively into the hands of the upstart across the sea, the United States, by far the most powerful and wealthy society in world history.

Those who say religion has nothing to do with politics do not know what religion is.

Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

The wicked leader is he who the people despise. The good leader is he who the people revere. The great leader is he who the people say, ‚We did it ourselves.‘

The strength and power of a country depends absolutely on the quantity of good men and women in it.

I’m substantially concerned about the policy directions of the space agency. We have a situation in the U.S. where the White House and Congress are at odds over what the future direction should be. They’re sort of playing a game and NASA is the shuttlecock that they’re hitting back and forth.

If you do not wish a man to do a thing, you had better get him to talk about it; for the more men talk, the more likely they are to do nothing else.

I have been influenced in my thinking by both west and east.

In the case of Yugoslavia v. NATO, one of the charges was genocide. The U.S. appealed to the court, saying that, by law, the United States is immune to the charge of genocide, self-immunized, and the court accepted that, so the case proceeded against the other NATO powers, but not against the United States.

Before the 1970s, banks were banks. They did what banks were supposed to do in a state capitalist economy: they took unused funds from your bank account, for example, and transferred them to some potentially useful purpose like helping a family buy a home or send a kid to college.

Idealism is the noble toga that political gentlemen drape over their will to power.

The reward of one duty is the power to fulfill another.

Everybody, to some extent, manipulates. Even children learn to cry when they want something. There are all kinds of subtle things we do to get others to follow our lead, not bother us, and so on.

This election is about who’s going to be the next President of the United States!

I like Italian movies. I was frequently there in the ’60s, in Rome and the vicinity. It was a great period in life. I was very influenced by their stuff.

People crushed by laws, have no hope but to evade power. If the laws are their enemies, they will be enemies to the law; and those who have most to hope and nothing to lose will always be dangerous.

I can’t imagine what this place would be – I can’t imagine what the country would be – with Donald Trump as our president.

Power has only one duty – to secure the social welfare of the People.

In a world of complex threats, our security and leadership depends on all elements of our power – including strong and principled diplomacy.

Use power to help people. For we are given power not to advance our own purposes nor to make a great show in the world, nor a name. There is but one just use of power and it is to serve people.