Sally Quinn Quotes

I was circulating around briefing these guys. Starting with Mitchell, and Haldeman, and [domestic policy adviser] John Ehrlichman, and all the guys. Just sort of circulating around with a briefcase. I cobbled together a briefing of a sort that would do the trick. And introduced them to technical systems of one kind or another.

I liked Nixon fine, but Nixon was not a partier.

In my years working in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, I had learned that those who seek the presidency are prepared to stop at almost nothing to get their party’s nomination.

I love to meet people; it’s the only fun I have.

Our oath is not to a politician, or to the party in power, or to the President. It is to the Constitution.

In much of the democratic world, citizens lack any confidence that politicians, political parties, or government officials are serving anyone other than themselves.

Out of the gobbledygook comes a very clear thing: you can't trust the government; you can't believe what they say; and you can't rely on their judgment. And the implicit infallibility of presidents, which has been an accepted thing in America, is badly hurt by this, because it shows that people do things the President wants to do even though it's wrong, and the President can be wrong.

In the early days of the Republic, civil service officers as well as the Presidents and the Cabinet, were generally selected from well-known families…. Andrew Johnson, would not have passed a test by a civil service commission; it would not have required a profound psychological knowledge to arrive at the conclusion, that a man may rise from the tailor shop to … the gubernatorial chair, and yet be morally and intellectually incapable of presiding … over the destinies of a great nation.

We will never know what would have happened if President Johnson had said no to more troops and more war [in Vietnam]. We do know what happened when he said yes.

I was asked to write a press briefing emphasizing the positive steps the administration had taken in the area and minimizing the negative ones. I was an Assistant to the President. I have done that for several Presidents. When you’re on the staff of the President of the United States you try and make things look as good as possible.

A minister of state is excusable for the harm he does when the helm of government has forced his hand in a storm; but in the calm he is guilty of all the good he does not do.

Nixon is the kind of politician who would cut down a redwood tree and then mount the stump to make a speech for conservation.

Reveal Richard Nixon … lay him and his motives bare … destroy him in his shot for the Presidency.

They want what every first term administration wants—a second term.

Rockefeller brought a lot of balance to my administration…. I wanted him on the ticket but if Rockefeller had stayed on the ticket I would probably have not gotten the nomination. Ronald Reagan would have gotten the nomination. Rockefeller made the unselfish decision to withdraw so I could win the nomination.

I have dealt with politicians ever since I came into the government in 1971. I have seen many prime ministers, many finance ministers.

Few politicians did much to move the needle toward anything resembling gender equality, but it was President Nixon who first threw women under the political bus of Movement Conservatism.

Anyone who listens to the Nixon White House would recognize that Nixon, who was in the Navy, was no stranger to profanity.

I'm not a party person.

I was never really a party person.

I remember, as a kid, nothing struck me funnier than seeing Richard Nixon look into the camera and sincerely tell everyone he didn't know where the 18 minutes had gone from his tapes. But there was all this sweat on his upper lip. We knew he was lying. He knew we knew he was lying. But he was determined to tell the lie.

I work very, very hard, so when I do get the chance to go out socially, it's a relatively big night. I also have hobbies on the side, and quite often, one runs into the other.

I don't care what your politics are, I would wager that if you asked any American woman which administration would she have most liked to work for as social secretary, she would pick Jacqueline Kennedy's White House as the place to be.

I have a lot of parties.

Within days of Richard Nixon's inauguration in January 1969, national-security adviser Kissinger asked the Pentagon to lay out his bombing options in Indochina. The previous president, Lyndon Baines Johnson, had suspended his own bombing campaign against North Vietnam in hopes of negotiating a broader cease-fire.