A. Scott Berg Quotes

Obama and his associates are fantastic campaigners but have little ability or skill to govern.

Over time, the best politics are policies that actually work …. Others in the White House are looking for short term political victories. The political hacks are just doing their jobs.

President Obama makes fantastic stump speeches, but putting together an actual agenda is more complicated.

You have to spend your political capital on great causes for your country.

The first requirement of a statesman is that he be dull.

It would be great if politics were fact-based, but it is not, and it is surely not nuance-based. What works in a classroom or a think tank does not work on Capitol Hill or in the White House. Obama sometimes seems to be running the Brookings Institution, not the country.

I think the problem with President Obama - and I like him personally, I came into the Senate with him - is his agenda.

The problem is that the right doesn't need any ideas to govern, but the left can't govern without ideas.

When you see how the President makes political or policy decisions, you see who he is. The essence of the Presidency is decision-making.

Politics doesn't matter, policy does.

Politics is not a game for naive thinkers. You may go in as an idealist, but you certainly won't come out as one.

We will govern as if we had a majority. You simply carry on with your agenda.

Democratic politics involves both principals and power. To argue only for principles is narcissistically self indulgent.

In politics it's very dangerous to have a philosophy. In a democracy you should have politicians who settle the problems that exist, not who set out to prove philosophical ideals.

You're going to find that, intellectually, the [governors] as a whole are a cut or two above what they were 10 or 20 years ago.

Governing is about selecting.

The policy now seems to be to squeeze out anyone who is tainted by strong fighting ideas…. It seems to me that official Sinn Fein is inclined to be ever less militant and ever more political and theoretical…. It is rather pitiful.

Our system does not know how to bring strength and intellect into the front rank of politics and government...

I am sure of my ability to form a good government.

Is Bill Clinton so good at politics, or are other politicians so bad?

To a certain extent, platforms are platitudes that you test when you get to govern. You have to run those priorities up against the opposition and decide what's most important.

I know it may be hard to imagine given how broken and gridlocked our politics truly are, but from the White House to, yes, Congress, the government is filled with hard-working, idealistic public servants working incredibly hard on tough issues, trying to make people's lives better and move the country, and our world, forward.

I cannot think of a president or administration that has taken seriously the 100 days.

We consistently allow politicians to get away with playing identity politics rather than demanding evidence of what they're going to do and how they're going to do it.

At the heart of all problems lies the politics of the country.