James M. Buchanan Quotes

Now, you might say – “But why should we pay people for doing what they’re supposed to do?” It’s a fair question – but think of it this way: Every other anti-poverty program that’s been tried has failed to get the national poverty rate below 11 percent... Why shouldn’t we experiment with a program built around the one strategy that has proven time and again to work wonders – capitalism?

If there'd been a better-balanced society, where there were other ways of making a decent living, I think it might have been different. That's not the way this setup work.

I think there are people in this Congress who actually believe that government does not have a benign role in the lives of the people, except as an engine to redistribute the wealth of the Nation upwards.

We have countries where, if we make a product and we send it to that country, they charge us 100 percent tax. If they make the same product and send it to us, we charge them nothing. You think that's smart? It's not.

I think that if you can butter writers up enough, they might give you a little.

It just bothered me that you might think I'm somethin special. I aint.

Will I criticize Hillary Clinton on her position of TPP, or the lack of position? Will I criticize her on her views of Wall Street? Will I criticize her on foreign policy? That's what democracy is about, but taking cheap shots at people, making it personal, I don't think that's what politics should be about.

If you think fast food is hittin a deer att 65 miles per hr.. you might be a redneck

Thinking that other people might be better than you is what makes you Canadian, not American.

If we have a phased redeployment where we're as careful getting out as we were careless getting in, then there's not reason why we shouldn't be able to prevent the wholesale slaughter I think some people have suggested might occur.

I don't think "Reganomics" will ever fully end. I mean, Reaganomics, to put it simply, was trying to get low taxes for wealthy people. And wealthy people are still there pushing for low taxes.

You're already a financial trader. You might not think of it in just this way, but if you work for a living, you're trading your time for money. Frankly, it's just about the worst trade you can make. Why? You can always get more money, but you can't get more time.

You know, I'm the President during this period of time, but I think when the history of this period is written, people will realize a lot of the decisions that were made on Wall Street took place over a decade or so, before I arrived in President, during I arrived in President.

I think President Barack Obama is going to be treated very, very well by history in terms of his ability to save the economy. And that's certainly true in rural areas. The unemployment rate is substantially reduced, the poverty rate is down, and in large part because of the investments that were made during the Recovery Act and thereafter, historic investments.

I think we need to push harder, we the Democrats, because it's an open door for the Republicans - prosperity centers.

A general flat minimum-wage law for all industry is permissible, but I do not think that it is a particularly wise method of achieving the end. I know much better methods of providing a minimum for everybody. But once you turn from laying down a general minimum for all industry to decreeing particular and different minimum for different industries, then, of course, you make the price mechanism inoperative, because it is no longer the price mechanism which will guide people between industries and trades.

I agree with Marco [Rubio] that we can't afford another four years like the last eight years that we've had under [Barack] Obama, for sure. That we concur on. I think we need someone with proven executive leadership to be able to make that case to the American people.

Most of the bands that I really like no longer exist. That might just be because I'm in my thirties or whatever. But I also think it's the rare band that doesn't, like, turn into something else.

I'm generally a very annoyingly positive person, in real life. I think that might have something to do with my gravitation towards angry human beings on screen.

I think there's even a chance that [R&D and innovation budgets] might be increased [during Donald Trump Administration] and we should go and make that case to the executive branch, to the Congress.

If somebody comes before me and I think that they will do a good job in fulfilling the mission - even if I might not have nominated them - if I think they're gonna do a good job, I vote for 'em.

In general, I think what Donald Trump's message is, is: I'm a very practical, execution-oriented entrepreneur who built a successful business. I've demonstrated an ability to go global with my business. I can get along with a lot of different people. There are certain problems in the United States right now born from faulty policy. So what is happening right now is the lower and middle class are being left behind by the globalization and by the global elite. I think that's basically his message, and Bernie Sanders' is similar.

The country wants the president and the Congress focused on jobs and the economy. Any regulation that the president promulgates that isn't focused on, I think, is a risk for him, and the same is true for Congress.

Rosencrantz: We might as well be dead. Do you think death could possibly be a boat? Guildenstern: No, no, no... Death is...not. Death isn't. You take my meaning. Death is the ultimate negative. Not-being. You can't not-be on a boat. Rosencrantz: I've frequently not been on boats. Guildenstern: No, no, no--what you've been is not on boats.