Jeremiah Wright Quotes

You don’t become a statesman unless you are first a good politician.

No man can be a politician except he be first a historian.

I would make a horrible politician, because I wouldn't enjoy my work.

I'm not really much into politics, because it's rarely discussed in my line of work, but I know that Barack Obama is trying his best, and that at some point down the road, he's going to get it right.

A politician is a statesman who approaches every question with an open mouth.

Right away when I got to college, I realized that being a politician sucks. It's really hard! It wasn't for me. B.J. Novak is convinced that I will run for mayor of Chicago at some point. He begs me to do it. It'd be a tough gig, but I was always very attracted to the idea of helping people and trying to make the city a better place.

The purpose of a politician is to be a leader. A politician has to lead. Otherwise he's just a follower.

Politics is about putting yourself in a state of grace.

A statesman is a politician who’s been dead ten or fifteen years.

A good politicians knows his friends and a good politician knows his enemies.

I believe that [Bill] Clinton is the best tactical politician, certainly in my lifetime.

While not all politicians are statesmen, all statesmen are politicians.

Being in politics is like coaching football. You have to be smart enough to understand the game and dumb enough to think it's important.

A politician is a person with whose politics you don't agree; if you agree with him, he is a statesman.

A man’s got to walk if he is going to be in politics.

You have to be an optimist to be in politics.

Politics is not a science...but an art.

Politics is not a science, as the professors are apt to suppose. It is an art.

I ran for president. I ran for governor twice. And I've been the governor now for nearly seven years. I find that the people who are my best advisors are the people who are smart enough to give me really good advice and smart enough to keep their mouths shut about what advice they give me. And so if I want advisors that way, that's the kind of advisor I'm going to be for Donald Trump.

Politics was put in front of me. I do politics because it's the vehicle for change and because I happen to be good at it... I had this sort of calm fearlessness, that some would call foolishness.

I admire politicians. It is a really tough assignment, and I would fall at the first fence.

I've always thought Anne-Marie Slaughter would make a fantastic United States Senator or something. She's a real intellectual, but she's got enormous communicative skills and she's got government experience. The thing that drives me slightly crazy is the way we think about intellectuals as wooly, hopeless, arrogant, self-deceived, incapable.

Does Obama create confusion on purpose?

There are too many politicians in the world and too few statesmen.

Business is a useful tool in politics, but it's not enough. You need much more than to be a good businessman, to be a good politician.