George W. Bush Quotes

The foundation of leadership is your own moral compass. I think the best quality leaders really know where their moral compass is. They get it out when they are making decisions. It's their guide. But not only do you have to have a moral compass and take it out of your pocket, it has to have a true north.

I decide on the basis of conscience. A genuine leader doesn't reflect consensus, he molds consensus.

Divorced from ethics, leadership is reduced to management and politics to mere technique.

It isn't polls or public opinion at the moment that counts. It is right and wrong and leadership--men with fortitude, honesty, and a belief in the right that makes epochs in the history of the world.

To say America can have strong leadership without strong character is to say we can get water without the wet.

I think, as a president, you have to want respect. You can't look for love from the American people. You have to just do what you think is right. Some people will hate you, but others, in the long run, will respect you for what you've done.

In my presidency I've been guided by what's right, not what's popular.

Do I think faith will be an important part of being a good president? Yes, I do.

One of the presidents we could have done without.... There are some things I admire about Tyler, but there were also plenty of things that weren't so admirable.... The reason I have a certain amount of grudging respect for John Tyler is that he knew his own mind and stuck to his decisions.

Leaders can be moral-and they should be moral-without imposing their morality on others.

... The future is very markedly in your hands, its value and its moral standing in the world and among ourselves. If you will take the power you have and use it, I have no fear of the outcome of the future.

Those who are successfully to lead their fellow-men, should have once possessed the nobler feelings. We have all known individuals whose magnanimity was not likely to be troublesome on any occasion; but then they betrayed their own interests by unwisely omitting the consideration, that such feelings might exist in the breasts of those whom they had to guide and govern: for they themselves cannot even remember the time when in their eyes justice appeared preferable to expediency, the happiness of others to self-interest, or the welfare of a State to the advancement of a party.

We need moral leadership and courage in our world.

Ambition without principle never was long under the guidance of good sense.

My guiding principle as president has been to try to do the right thing even when it's not politically convenient.

People will not follow a leader with moral incongruities for long. Every time you compromise character you compromise leadership. The foundation of firm leadership is character.

The public wants elected officials who have character. The public wants elected officials who are willing to stand up and say things, even if they don't agree with them.

Leadership is not about popularity, it is about doing what is right.

I wanted to come to Washington, D.C. and help be a transformative President. And I think history, when they look back, will say this is a fellow who knew how to make decisions, and made some tough ones, stood by them, wasn't driven by the latest opinion poll, but was driven by some core principles from which he would not deviate.

I sometimes wonder how some people can live with themselves in some of the big companies today. So many far-reaching decisions are based on how they will affect the next shareholders' meeting.

Leadership consists of character and strategy. If you can't have both, opt for character.

I think that there are certain principles which should guide decision-making for a president. One such principle was that we're all God's children, and every life is precious. To me, that's a moral statement.

I would like to remembered as President as somebody who did not compromise principles in order to try to be loved or liked.

Barry Goldwater once said, "I'd rather be right than president." I can't tell you how much I disagree with that Barry Goldwater.

In a president, character is everything. A president doesn't have to be brilliant... He doesn't have to be clever; you can hire clever... You can hire pragmatic, and you can buy and bring in policy wonks. But you cant buy courage and decency, you cant rent a strong moral sense. A president must bring those things with him. He needs to have, in that much maligned word, but a good one nonetheless, a vision of the future he wishes to create.. But a vision is worth little if a president doesn't have the character - the courage and heart - to see it through.