Beau Willimon Quotes

What most men call their conscience is imaginary virtue switching left or right according to self-interest.

Sometimes people with strong ideology, whether left-wing or right-wing, refuse to do something simply because they believe it is wrong, when doing it actually benefits them. For some people, it's not just about money and political power.

I think the record speaks for itself. These are two individuals who have been for the war when the headlines were good and against it when their poll ratings were bad.

One has to be a lowbrow, a bit of a murderer, to be a politician, ready and willing to see people sacrificed, slaughtered, for the sake of an idea, whether a good one or a bad one.

Power focuses on self-preservation; principle focuses on making ideas successful.

Party honesty is party expediency.

The end must justify the means.

It has now become the doctrine of a large class of politicians that political honesty is unnecessary, slow, subversive of a man's interests, and incompatible with quick onward movement.

It's very true that you can be both selfless and selfish at the same time. What we tend towards, particularly in filmmaking, is this binary sort of, 'This is a good guy, this is a bad guy.' And I quite like the fact that life is a bit more complex than that.

On the whole, human beings want to be good, but not too good, and not quite all the time.

A wise ruler ought never to keep faith when by doing so it would be against his interests.

There is undoubtedly a lot of pressure that comes with recognition, which can be a good thing and bad thing all at the same time. But if you stay focused and don't lose sight of what you're doing and who you are, you can rise above it.

Men are not against you; they are merely for themselves.

Power tends to protect itself merely to maintain its own status and control. Principle gives up power for the sake of creating the best public policy.

Politics is never about the people. It's about money. And wars. And how many heads you can step on and bodies you can step over. And I'm just not that kind of person.

Everybody is a hypocrite. You can't live on this planet without being a hypocrite.

Politics are about preserving relationships at the end of the day, and it has nothing to do with the greater good for humanity. It's just all about business.

A little hypocrisy is better than losing.

Ambition is the mother of hypocrisy and prefers to skulk in corners and dark places. It cannot endure the light of day. It is an unclean vice wallowing in the depths, always hidden, but with ever an eye to advancement.

He [William Gladstone] made his conscience not his guide but his accomplice.

No one can expect a majority to be stirred by motives other than ignoble.

A prudent ruler cannot and should not observe faith [keep his promises] when such observance is to his disadvantage.

The prince must not mind incurring the scandal of those vices without which it would be difficult to save the state.

Self-interest is not only a legitimate but a fundamental cause for national policy—one which needs no cloak of hypocrisy.

Man has always sacrificed truth to his vanity, comfort and advantage.