Michael Ashcroft Quotes

I didn't much like being in Parliament physically. I found it a bit depressing. It's very dark and heavy. I like being out and about.

Politics, I believe, is a full-time occupation.

I really hate I being a congressman because all it is is constituent service.

I have toured my constituency maximum number of times as a member of the Lok Sabha among the MPs from Madhya Pradesh.

I think she [Hillary Clinton] would be far superior to President [Barack] Obama, who is basically remote, aloof and not involved with - he doesn't deal with members of Congress.

My father was prime minister, and to take care of his home, to be his hostess, automatically meant to have my hands in politics - to meet people, to know their games, their secrets.

I think it was interesting to be steeped in that [political] world.

The job of a legislator is much more fixing existing law, revising it, improving it, than it is passing something that doesn't exist.

People who consider themselves political, who follow political developments most rigorously, are often those who view the political process with the greatest lack of perspective.

You know why I got involved in politics? The government is now a majority partner in my life. I am now a minority partner in my own life.

The question for me is not are we political, but how are we political? We need to be politically engaged, but peculiar in how we engage.

I'm not interested in politics, or being a part of them. I definitely do my homework and make sure that I know what's going on, and I'm responsible enough to be able to vote for people that I respect. But other than that, I've never been a part of the political world.

I am a political recidivist. An incorrigible, repeat voter. A career lever-pusher. My electoral rap sheet is as long as your arm. Over the course of three decades, I have voted for presidents and school board members. I have voted in high hopes and high dudgeon. I have voted in favor of candidates and merely against their opponents. I have voted for propositions written with such complexity that I needed Noam Chomsky to deconstruct their meaning. I have been a single-issue voter and a marginal voter. I have even voted for people who ran unopposed. Hold an election and I'll be there.

didn't come from a particularly political family. My parents were regular voters. My parents didn't make enough money to contribute to campaigns, and they didn't really knock on doors for candidates when I was growing up.

There is a very strong socialist movement in Jamaica. I was in Jamaica years ago. All the talk, all day they talk politics. The literacy rate is very low. Everyone is so interested in politics, more than those who can read in the United States.

I grew up in the '50s and '60s when Jack Kennedy was president. We would watch him on television. And our teachers always talked about the good things public servants could do. I thought maybe that's something I should do. So when I got out of law school, my wife, Jane, and I became precinct captains.

I'm more patriotic than I am political - I appreciate politics but I'm not quite too sure if that's a road I'm willing to go down.

I have always been involved in issue-based politics, not party politics - I was never really originally drawn to party politics.

I have served the Liberal cause for twenty-two years. That ought to be long enough for anyones lifetime.

A writer represents his family history. My grandfather was a senator and my father served in the Roosevelt administration. In other words, I grew up in politics. This is why it seemed perfectly natural to take part in the battles of my time, and to participate in the writing of the history of my country.

These are two opposing forces, and whenever I am in active politics, I stop writing. And when I'm writing, I don't politick.

I'm impatient not with the House of Commons as an institution, but with the way in which it is operated. This doesn't prove I don't believe in participatory democracy.

Politics is a life sentence. It's an obsessive, all-demanding, utterly fascinating, totally committing profession - stimulating, satisfying, stretching.

I'll be active in politics through PACs at a later date.

When I'm in office I always keep Members of Parliament talking. If they stopped they might start thinking.