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Conservative Quotations
Alfred E. Wiggam:
A conservative is a man who believes that nothing should be done for the
first time.
Ambrose Bierce:
Conservative: a statesman who is enamoured of existing evils, as
distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others.
Barbara Ehrenreich:
The only truly new ideas [the right] has come up with in the last twenty
years are (1) supply side economics, which is a way of redistributing the
wealth upward toward those who already have more than they know what to do
with, and (2) creationism, which is a parallel idea for redistributing
ignorance out from its fundamentalist strongholds to those who know more
than they need to.
Benjamin Disraeli:
Conservatism discards Prescription, shrinks from Principle, disavows
Progress; having rejected all respect for antiquity, it offers no redress
for the present, and makes no preparation for the future.
Benjamin Disraeli:
A Conservative Government is an organized hypocrisy.
Elbert Hubbard:
A conservative is a man who is too cowardly to fight and too fat to run.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt:
A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never
learned how to walk forward.
James W. Skillen:
American liberals and conservatives share much of the same political
heritage. Originally the term Liberal referred to the political and economic
ideal of liberating individuals from unrepresentative and arbitrary
governments. Early liberalism set in motion patterns for the rule of law
that would guarantee individual rights, representation in law making, access
to the courts, and protection of private property. Both conservatives and
liberals are Liberal in this sense. But whereas American conservatives of
various stripes have continued to place primary emphasis on individual
freedom, the autonomy of private institutions, and limits to government in
the economic area, American liberals have more frequently appealed to
government to advance the liberation of individuals from economic, racial,
and political disadvantages in society as a whole.
John Kenneth Galbraith:
The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral
philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for
selfishness.
John Stuart Mill:
Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are
conservatives.
Leo C. Rosten:
A conservative is one who admires radicals centuries after they're dead.
Mark Twain:
The radical of one century is the conservative of the next. The radical
invents the views. When he has worn them out, the conservative adopts them.
Mignon McLaughlin:
Every society honors its live conformists and its dead troublemakers.
Mort Sahl:
Liberals feel unworthy of their possessions. Conservatives feel they deserve
everything they've stolen.
P. J. O'Rourke:
The Democrats are the party of government activism, the party that says
government can make you richer, smarter, taller, and get the chickweed out
of your lawn. Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work,
and then get elected and prove it.
Ralph Waldo Emerson:
Reform is affirmative, conservatism negative; conservatism goes for comfort,
reform for truth.
Tom DeLay:
Guns have little or nothing to do with juvenile violence. The causes of
youth violence are working parents who put their kids into daycare, the
teaching of evolution in the schools, and working mothers who take birth
control pills. [on causes of the Columbine High School massacre, 1999]
William Gladstone:
Liberalism is trust of the people, tempered by prudence; conservatism,
distrust of people, tempered by fear.
Woodrow Wilson:
A conservative is a man who sits and thinks, mostly sits.
Woodrow Wilson:
A conservative is someone who makes no changes and consults his grandmother
when in doubt.
Andy Rooney:
Democrats (I think to myself) are liberals who believe the people are
basically good, but that they need government help to organize their lives.
They believe in freedom so fervently that they think it should be
compulsory. They believe that the poor and ignorant are victims of an unfair
system and that their circumstances can be improved if we give them help.
Republicans (I think to myself) are conservatives who think it would
be best if we faced the fact that people are no damned good. They think that
if we admit that we have selfish, acquisitive natures and then set out to
get all we can for ourselves by working hard for it, that things will be
better for everyone. They are not insensitive to the poor, but tend to think
the poor are impoverished because they won't work. They think there would be
fewer of them to feel sorry for if the government did not encourage the
proliferation of the least fit among us with welfare programs.
Ann Richards on How to Be a Good Republican:
You have to believe that the nation's current 8-year prosperity was due to
the work of Ronald Reagan and George Bush, but yesterday's gasoline prices
are all Clinton's fault.
You have to believe that those privileged from birth achieve success all on
their own.
You have to be against all government programs, but expect Social Security
checks on time.
You have to believe that AIDS victims deserve their disease, but smokers
with lung cancer and overweight individuals with heart disease don't deserve
theirs.
You have to appreciate the
power rush that comes with sporting a gun.
You have to
believe...everything Rush Limbaugh says.
You have to believe that
the agricultural, restaurant, housing and hotel industries can survive
without immigrant labor.
You have to believe God
hates homosexuality, but loves the death penalty.
You have to believe society
is color-blind and growing up black in America doesn't diminish your
opportunities, but you still won't vote for Alan Keyes.
You have to believe that
pollution is OK as long as it makes a profit.
You have to believe in
prayer in schools, as long as you don't pray to Allah or Buddha.
You have to believe Newt
Gingrich and Henry Hyde were really faithful husbands.
You have to believe
speaking a few Spanish phrases makes you instantly popular in the barrio.
You have to believe that
only your own teenagers are still virgins.
You have to be against
government interference in business, until your oil company, corporation or
Savings and Loan is about to go broke and you beg for a government bail out.
You love Jesus and Jesus
loves you and, by the way, Jesus shares your hatred for AIDS victims,
homosexuals, and President Clinton.
You have to believe
government has nothing to do with providing police protection, national
defense, and building roads.
You have to believe a poor,
minority student with a disciplinary history and failing grades will be
admitted into an elite private school with a $1,000 voucher.
Alfred E. Wiggam:
A conservative is a man who believes that nothing should be done for the
first time.
Ambrose Bierce:
Conservative: a statesman who is enamoured of existing evils, as
distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others.
Barbara Ehrenreich:
The only truly new ideas [the right] has come up with in the last twenty
years are (1) supply side economics, which is a way of redistributing the
wealth upward toward those who already have more than they know what to do
with, and (2) creationism, which is a parallel idea for redistributing
ignorance out from its fundamentalist strongholds to those who know more
than they need to.
Benjamin Disraeli:
Conservatism discards Prescription, shrinks from Principle, disavows
Progress; having rejected all respect for antiquity, it offers no redress
for the present, and makes no preparation for the future.
Benjamin Disraeli:
A Conservative Government is an organized hypocrisy.
Elbert Hubbard:
A conservative is a man who is too cowardly to fight and too fat to run.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt:
A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never
learned how to walk forward.
James W. Skillen:
American liberals and conservatives share much of the same political
heritage. Originally the term Liberal referred to the political and economic
ideal of liberating individuals from unrepresentative and arbitrary
governments. Early liberalism set in motion patterns for the rule of law
that would guarantee individual rights, representation in law making, access
to the courts, and protection of private property. Both conservatives and
liberals are Liberal in this sense. But whereas American conservatives of
various stripes have continued to place primary emphasis on individual
freedom, the autonomy of private institutions, and limits to government in
the economic area, American liberals have more frequently appealed to
government to advance the liberation of individuals from economic, racial,
and political disadvantages in society as a whole.
John Kenneth Galbraith:
The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral
philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for
selfishness.
John Stuart Mill:
Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are
conservatives.
Leo C. Rosten:
A conservative is one who admires radicals centuries after they're dead.
Mark Twain:
The radical of one century is the conservative of the next. The radical
invents the views. When he has worn them out, the conservative adopts them.
Mignon McLaughlin:
Every society honors its live conformists and its dead troublemakers.
Mort Sahl:
Liberals feel unworthy of their possessions. Conservatives feel they deserve
everything they've stolen.
P. J. O'Rourke:
The Democrats are the party of government activism, the party that says
government can make you richer, smarter, taller, and get the chickweed out
of your lawn. Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work,
and then get elected and prove it.
Ralph Waldo Emerson:
Reform is affirmative, conservatism negative; conservatism goes for comfort,
reform for truth.
Tom DeLay:
Guns have little or nothing to do with juvenile violence. The causes of
youth violence are working parents who put their kids into daycare, the
teaching of evolution in the schools, and working mothers who take birth
control pills. [on causes of the Columbine High School massacre, 1999]
William Gladstone:
Liberalism is trust of the people, tempered by prudence; conservatism,
distrust of people, tempered by fear.
Woodrow Wilson:
A conservative is a man who sits and thinks, mostly sits.
Woodrow Wilson:
A conservative is someone who makes no changes and consults his grandmother
when in doubt.
Andy Rooney:
Democrats (I think to myself) are liberals who believe the people are
basically good, but that they need government help to organize their lives.
They believe in freedom so fervently that they think it should be
compulsory. They believe that the poor and ignorant are victims of an unfair
system and that their circumstances can be improved if we give them help.
Republicans (I think to myself) are conservatives who think it would
be best if we faced the fact that people are no damned good. They think that
if we admit that we have selfish, acquisitive natures and then set out to
get all we can for ourselves by working hard for it, that things will be
better for everyone. They are not insensitive to the poor, but tend to think
the poor are impoverished because they won't work. They think there would be
fewer of them to feel sorry for if the government did not encourage the
proliferation of the least fit among us with welfare programs.
Ann Richards on How to Be a Good Republican:
You have to believe that the nation's current 8-year prosperity was due to
the work of Ronald Reagan and George Bush, but yesterday's gasoline prices
are all Clinton's fault.
You have to believe that those privileged from birth achieve success all on
their own.
You have to be against all government programs, but expect Social Security
checks on time.
You have to believe that AIDS victims deserve their disease, but smokers
with lung cancer and overweight individuals with heart disease don't deserve
theirs.
You have to appreciate the
power rush that comes with sporting a gun.
You have to
believe...everything Rush Limbaugh says.
You have to believe that
the agricultural, restaurant, housing and hotel industries can survive
without immigrant labor.
You have to believe God
hates homosexuality, but loves the death penalty.
You have to believe society
is color-blind and growing up black in America doesn't diminish your
opportunities, but you still won't vote for Alan Keyes.
You have to believe that
pollution is OK as long as it makes a profit.
You have to believe in
prayer in schools, as long as you don't pray to Allah or Buddha.
You have to believe Newt
Gingrich and Henry Hyde were really faithful husbands.
You have to believe
speaking a few Spanish phrases makes you instantly popular in the barrio.
You have to believe that
only your own teenagers are still virgins.
You have to be against
government interference in business, until your oil company, corporation or
Savings and Loan is about to go broke and you beg for a government bail out.
You love Jesus and Jesus
loves you and, by the way, Jesus shares your hatred for AIDS victims,
homosexuals, and President Clinton.
You have to believe
government has nothing to do with providing police protection, national
defense, and building roads.
You have to believe a poor,
minority student with a disciplinary history and failing grades will be
admitted into an elite private school with a $1,000 voucher.
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