I’m not a reality-TV kind of guy. But it’s almost like we’re living in a reality show. Every day in this country, everybody keeps worrying about the deterioration of America, and it’s like a big reality show.

I know that if I had a television in my flat I would convince myself that everything on it was really interesting. I would say, ‚I’m a Celebrity – Get Me Out of Here!‘ is so sociologically fascinating that I think I’d better watch.

The arts have only ever interested a small minority of people, which acted as a kind of nursery to support artists.

When I was 18, I went to the Soviet Union. I kept hearing that America was planning to bomb them – lots of bombs were going to come down on these people. I went there not knowing anything, except that I thought the whole thing was stupid and that I wanted to see who these people were that we were going to bomb.

It is clearly better that property should be private, but the use of it common; and the special business of the legislator is to create in men this benevolent disposition.

Babylon is everywhere. You have wrong and you have right. Wrong is what we call Babylon, wrong things. That is what Babylon is to me. I could have born in England, I could have born in America, it make no difference where me born, because there is Babylon everywhere.

The most dangerous creation of any society is the man who has nothing to lose.

In America there’s no way I can make the kind of movie I like to make.

In a summer marked by instability in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, I know the world also took notice of the small American city of Ferguson, Missouri – where a young man was killed, and a community was divided. So yes, we have our own racial and ethnic tensions.

Selling an electric sports car creates an opportunity to fundamentally change the way America drives.

If workers are more insecure, that’s very ‚healthy‘ for the society, because if workers are insecure, they won’t ask for wages, they won’t go on strike, they won’t call for benefits; they’ll serve the masters gladly and passively. And that’s optimal for corporations‘ economic health.

You’ll never have a quiet world till you knock the patriotism out of the human race.

The society in ‚The Handmaid’s Tale‘ is a throwback to the early Puritans whom I studied extensively at Harvard under Perry Miller, to whom the book is dedicated.

In America, there might be better gastronomic destinations than New Orleans, but there is no place more uniquely wonderful.

This is America. You’re entitled to believe what you want.

I have never thought it necessary to patronize the American people.

What constitutes a real, live human being is more of a mystery than ever these days, and men each one of whom is a valuable, unique experiment on the part of nature are shot down wholesale.

Today we did what we had to do. They counted on America to be passive. They counted wrong.

Art is not a treasure in the past or an importation from another land, but part of the present life of all living and creating peoples.

Let’s not burn the universities yet. After all, the damage they do might be worse.

Where there is righteousness in the heart, there is harmony in the house; when there is harmony in the house, there is order in the nation; when there is order in the nation, there is peace in the world.

Society therefore is as ancient as the world.

I think that people are tired. They’re tired of the same old kind of politics. People want a new tone to politics.

The last person I have ever criticized is an official. They have a tough job to do. Things are happening so quick.

All who think cannot but see there is a sanction like that of religion which binds us in partnership in the serious work of the world.

The world is in a constant conspiracy against the brave. It’s the age-old struggle: the roar of the crowd on the one side, and the voice of your conscience on the other.

Here in America, we don’t give in to our fears. We don’t build up walls to keep people out.

Censorship ends in logical completeness when nobody is allowed to read any books except the books that nobody reads.

The world, as a rule, does not live on beaches and in country clubs.

In December, I agreed to extend the tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans because it was the only way I could prevent a tax hike on middle-class Americans. But we cannot afford $1 trillion worth of tax cuts for every millionaire and billionaire in our society. We can’t afford it. And I refuse to renew them again.

In too much of the West, everyone wants the guarantee of safety, and never having to make any decisions.

I would not give half a guinea to live under one form of government other than another. It is of no moment to the happiness of an individual.

I don’t know why women want any of the things men have when one of the things that women have is men.

What we call Man’s power over Nature turns out to be a power exercised by some men over other men with Nature as its instrument.

People are generally proud of their food. A willingness to eat and drink with people without fear and prejudice… they open up to you in ways that somebody visiting who is driven by a story may not get.

The world is all the richer for having a devil in it, so long as we keep our foot upon his neck.

Unlike many of its European neighbors, Britain shares many of America’s financial traits.

I have this feeling that the world is not in balance. And people are afraid, but we’re also starting to be really brave.

Great tragedy has come to us, and we are meeting it with the best that is in our country, with courage and concern for others because this is America. This is who we are.

Excessive literary production is a social offense.

First, how do we give everyone a fair shot at opportunity and security in this new economy? Second, how do we make technology work for us, and not against us – especially when it comes to solving urgent challenges like climate change? Third, how do we keep America safe and lead the world without becoming its policeman?

It’s important that we invest in America – literally. The terrorists wanted to destroy our economy, and we can’t let our system fall apart. We also have to invest in one another.

We live in an imperfect world, and imperfect people surround us every day.

If you’re not producing as much as you consume, or perhaps a little more, then clearly we cannot use the big organization of our society for the purpose of keeping you alive, because your life does not benefit us, and it can’t be of very much use to yourself.

The decline of literature indicates the decline of a nation.

This is a wonderful planet, and it is being completely destroyed by people who have too much money and power and no empathy.

The 21st century is going to be the American century. Because we lead not only by the example of our power, but by the power of our example. That is the history of the journey of America.

I think that people want peace so much that one of these days government had better get out of their way and let them have it.

Among a people generally corrupt liberty cannot long exist.

Justice in the life and conduct of the State is possible only as first it resides in the hearts and souls of the citizens.

There’s a lot of revisionist history that goes on these days about Iraq.

I disagree with any policy that would turn America’s back on people who are fleeing harm. I frankly believe that it is contrary to everything that we have symbolically and actually said we stand for.

We welcome the scrutiny of the world – because what you see in America is a country that has steadily worked to address our problems and make our union more perfect.

The ruling ideas of each age have ever been the ideas of its ruling class.

In England, football is a big thing to talk about, but Liverpool, it’s a special place. You feel it when you make your first step.

The American people have not become heartless.

For my part, I desire to see the time when education – and by its means, morality, sobriety, enterprise and industry – shall become much more general than at present, and should be gratified to have it in my power to contribute something to the advancement of any measure which might have a tendency to accelerate the happy period.

The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom.

I’ve come to the conclusion that mythology is really a form of archaeological psychology. Mythology gives you a sense of what a people believes, what they fear.

America is the student who defies the odds to become the first in a family to go to college – the citizen who defies the cynics and goes out there and votes – the young person who comes out of the shadows to demand the right to dream. That’s what America is about.

The world is a republic of mediocrities, and always was.