Boris Yeltsin Quotes

To rule is easy, to govern difficult.

It's so much easier to throw rocks than it is to govern.

The Prime Minister is head of team but its not a one woman act. I've been called all those things. Intellectual, sharp-tongued, all true. But what New Zealander is like is to know that someone is in charge and in the end the buck stops with the Prime Minister.

It is easier to run a revolution than a government.

Elected leaders who forget how they got there won't the next time.

One cannot govern with 'buts'.

I'm eternally grateful to fate and the citizens of Russia that they've trusted me to be the head of the Russian government.

Benghazi matters because Americans deserve to know the truth from those entrusted to lead and govern.

At Athens, wise men propose, and fools dispose.

I wanted the influence. In the end I wasn't very good at being a president. I looked out of the window and thought that the man cutting the lawn actually seemed to have more control over what he was doing.

If you present good government, then elections look after themselves.

Rulers come and go; governments end and forms of government change; but sovereignty survives.

All government is a trust. Every branch of government is a trust, and immemorially acknowledged to be so.

The people who own the country are now going to get to run it.

If you cannot trust our leaders, you cannot govern.

The fellow that has power is the one who uses it sparingly ... I had more power when I went into office than when I went out.

To govern is to chose.

The people are difficult to govern: It is because those in authority are too fond of action [change].

Whoso taketh in hand to govern a multitude, either by way of liberty or principality, and cannot assure himself of those persons that are enemies to that enterprise, doth frame a state of short perseverance.

No ruler who lacks the gift of persuasion can stay in office long; it is the indispensable condition of government. It would be an idle illusion to assume that any government, no matter how good, could lastingly do without public consent.

We cannot long protect liberty if our leaders continue to act like mere bystanders in the work of government.

Think well before selecting your leader, and when you have selected him, follow him. But in case you find his policy detrimental to your interests, kick him out.

I think it's time that we said to people who are incapable of acknowledging that they've ever got anything wrong: 'I'm sorry, you've had your day.' Unelected, unaccountable elites, I'm afraid it's time to say, 'You're fired. We are going to take back control.'

He who is to be a good ruler must have first been ruled.

Leadership is important in politics.