The court generally moves in small steps rather than in one giant step.

If I had chosen the populist course, it would have been a breach of the trust placed in me by the people.

The decisive moment in human evolution is perpetual. That is why the revolutionary spiritual movements that declare all former things worthless are in the right, for nothing has yet happened.

My authoritarian and quick manner of making decisions led me to have serious problems and to be accused of being ultraconservative. I have never been a right-winger. It was my authoritarian way of making decisions that created problems.

I don’t think there’s any point going for second or third.

And so our goal on health care is, if we can get, instead of health care costs going up 6 percent a year, it’s going up at the level of inflation, maybe just slightly above inflation, we’ve made huge progress. And by the way, that is the single most important thing we could do in terms of reducing our deficit. That’s why we did it.

A majority is always better than the best repartee.

I believe you have to be willing to be misunderstood if you’re going to innovate.

The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity. The fears are paper tigers. You can do anything you decide to do. You can act to change and control your life; and the procedure, the process is its own reward.

Do I wear a helmet? Ugh. I do when I’m riding through a precarious part of town, meaning Midtown traffic. But when I’m riding on secure protected lanes or on the paths that run along the Hudson or through Central Park – no, I don’t wear the dreaded helmet then.

The over-all point is that new technology will not necessarily replace old technology, but it will date it. By definition. Eventually, it will replace it. But it’s like people who had black-and-white TVs when color came out. They eventually decided whether or not the new technology was worth the investment.

To see the right and not to do it is cowardice.

In crises the most daring course is often safest.

I would be stupid not to be on my own side. But I’m a human being, too. And I’m on the side of human beings, rather than on the side of crocodiles.

You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. You’re on your own, and you know what you know. And you are the guy who’ll decide where to go.

If virtue promises happiness, prosperity and peace, then progress in virtue is progress in each of these for to whatever point the perfection of anything brings us, progress is always an approach toward it.

You only have to do a very few things right in your life so long as you don’t do too many things wrong.

The die is cast.

In a universe that’s an intelligent system with a divine creative force supporting it, there simply can be no accidents. As tough as it is to acknowledge, you had to go through what you went through in order to get to where you are today, and the evidence is that you did.

When in doubt tell the truth.

You can tell the tree by the fruit it bears. You see it through what the organization is delivering as far as a concrete program. If the tree’s fruit sours or grows brackish, then the time has come to chop it down – bury it and walk over it and plant new seeds.

I feel good because I believe I have made progress in rebuilding the people’s trust in their government.

We have to confront ourselves. Do we like what we see in the mirror? And, according to our light, according to our understanding, according to our courage, we will have to say yea or nay – and rise!

To prefer evil to good is not in human nature; and when a man is compelled to choose one of two evils, no one will choose the greater when he might have the less.

Wise leaders generally have wise counselors because it takes a wise person themselves to distinguish them.

Freedom is absolutely necessary for the progress in science and the liberal arts.

The issues that cross a president’s desk are never easy. The easy questions don’t even get to the president.

To make headway, improve your head.

War contains so much folly, as well as wickedness, that much is to be hoped from the progress of reason.

We only consult the ear because the heart is wanting.

No country can act wisely simultaneously in every part of the globe at every moment of time.

When you’re 40, you can’t ride the fence anymore. You gotta make definite decisions about your life.

Anything important is never left to the vote of the people. We only get to vote on some man; we never get to vote on what he is to do.

Things alter for the worse spontaneously, if they be not altered for the better designedly.

When you have to make a choice and don’t make it, that is in itself a choice.

Some of the generals are saying, ‚We’re making progress. We are clearing an area.‘ But you really don’t defeat the Taliban by clearing an area. They move.

It’s no exaggeration to say that the undecideds could go one way or another.

Every President wants to do right.

I don’t think I’m bad for people. If I did think I was bad for people, I would go back to driving a truck, and I really mean this.

We have come to a turning point in the road. If we turn to the right mayhap our children and our children’s children will go that way; but if we turn to the left, generations yet unborn will curse our names for having been unfaithful to God and to His Word.

For time and the world do not stand still. Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or the present are certain to miss the future.

It is always your next move.

Of the blessings set before you make your choice, and be content.

I feel very strongly that SpaceX would not have been able to get started, nor would we have made the progress that we have, without the help of NASA.

The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground.

There are horrible people who, instead of solving a problem, tangle it up and make it harder to solve for anyone who wants to deal with it. Whoever does not know how to hit the nail on the head should be asked not to hit it at all.

Locally, I’ll vote one way and nationally, maybe another.

I just usually go with my own taste. If I like something, and it happens to be against the law, well, then I might have a problem.

Forethought we may have, undoubtedly, but not foresight.

When I’m in management meetings when we’re deciding my future, those decisions are left up to me. I’m the one who has to go out and fulfill all these obligations, so I should be able to choose which ones I do or not. That’s the part of my life where I feel most in control.

We have the resources to build room for a trillion humans in this solar system, and when we have a trillion humans, we’ll have a thousand Einsteins and a thousand Mozarts. It will be a way more interesting place to live.

I’ve never gone wrong trusting my gut.

Political courage is not political suicide.

I’ll be judged on the body of work and not the popularity of any one decision.

No man is so foolish but he may sometimes give another good counsel, and no man so wise that he may not easily err if he takes no other counsel than his own. He that is taught only by himself has a fool for a master.

The amazing fact is that America is founded on a document. It’s a work in progress. It can be tested by each generation.

Rhetoric is a poor substitute for action, and we have trusted only to rhetoric. If we are really to be a great nation, we must not merely talk; we must act big.

I had to make a choice at one point in my life, of missing films or missing my children. It was a very easy decision to make because I missed my children so very much.

I think I became more productive through not having children. I never really had the desire to have them. My husband didn’t want them either, so it worked out well.

Obviously I faced the possibility of not returning when first I considered going. Once faced and settled there really wasn’t any good reason to refer to it.

He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.