Reuven Rivlin Quotes

To rely upon conviction, devotion, and other excellent spiritual qualities; that is not to be taken seriously in politics.

Politics is the art of the possible.

In the last resort nations can only find security in doing what their material interests dictate.

The politician says: "I will give you what you want." The statesman says: "What you think you want is this. What it is possible for you to get is that. What you really want, therefore, is the following.

Bush doesn't present himself as a realpolitik politician.

Today, Democrats not only have the White House; they have the Senate too. So we have to be realistic about what we can and cannot achieve, while at the same recognizing that realism should never be confused with capitulation.

Reagan is held up to us as an example of never raising taxes. Correction: Reagan raised taxes six of his eight years as president. Why? He was a pragmatist, not doctrinaire. He saw problems emerging, and when his policies faltered he changed his views. Flexibility, not rigidity.

I want a politics that doesn't need to pretend to be holy or perfect or infallible. I want a politics that gets on with it.

I believe politicians should always remain realistic.

A statesman cannot afford to be a moralist.

When times are tough, constant conflict may be good politics but in the real world, cooperation works better. After all, nobody's right all the time, and a broken clock is right twice a day.

Politics is the art of the possible, the attainable, the art of the next best.

A pragmatist won't let ideology get in the way of what's got to be done to get elected.

[Ideological] Purity is fine but it doesn’t win elections and is not a governing strategy. Compromise is required.

When the President [Woodrow Wilson] talks of self-determination, what unit has he in mind. Does he mean a race, a territorial area, a community? … It will raise hopes which can never be realized. It will I fear cost thousands of lives. In the end it is bound to be discredited, to be called the dream of an idealist who failed to realize the danger until it was too late.

The laws were framed by certain well-meaning visionaries who, building republics in the air, have tried to reach political perfection on the assumption that humanity is perfect. So we have had philosophers instead of leaders, philanthropy instead of legislation, dialectic instead of tactics, and sophists instead of soldiers.

When it comes to foreign policy, the American people will ultimately reward not the party with the most ambitious vision but the party with the most sober and realistic one.

It is not that I believe ideals are unimportant, even among the realities of war; but if a nation is to survive in a hostile world, its ideals must be backed by the hard logic of military practicability.

I'm well aware of the pragmatism of politics.

I think football is football, politics is politics.

I'm putting jobs over ideology.

A supreme pragmatist, Kissinger was never interested in the art of the impossible - and nor, as a biographer, am I. That is why, having initially been invited to write his entire official biography, I eventually decided to devote myself to writing just one year in his life: 1973.

I ain't Martin Luther King. I don't need a dream. I have a plan.

Hopefully, Donald Trump's a very practical man.

In politics, as in life, we must above all things wish only for the attainable.