Tina Brown Quotes

I think we were all initially swept along with the Obama win, but he's proven to be simply a set of teeth, and useless in every other regard.

No one is asking for an Oprah in Chief. Anyhow, Obama is too chilly by nature ever to be convincing as a human care package.

I think reconciliation is Obama's goal - but the fight with the Republicans is like a fight with pit bulls, they never let go. Even worse, now the Republicans feel they can keep pushing and he will keep giving. They have not seen a stiff resistance on his part.

I think Clinton, after getting into office and into Washington, was shocked at being bludgeoned. So he spent time trying to be all things to all people - one way guaranteed not to be successful or respected in a lion's den. You can't just play around with all those big cats - you've got to take somebody on.

America is exceptional: but because it yields the likes of Obama, not the likes of Bush.

I have yet to see someone attack Obama over his report card. A lot of people I talk to from both sides of the fence are like, 'Well, what about this economy? What about these incidents?' There are still no answers except time, but time is the answer for everything.

I would like Obama to be tougher on going up against the Republicans, I don't think he should try to be so moderate.

Stylistically speaking, Barack Obama could hardly be further from Jimmy Carter if he really had been born in Kenya.

Obama learned from Ronald Reagan that it helps to strike an optimistic tone. But genuine optimism deriving from American exceptionalism, it turns out, does not come naturally to him.

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 shook Obama's hand and I said, 'I want to be your friend.' My hand is still outstretched. I am not Obama's enemy, but it's difficult not see imperialism in Washington. Those who don't see it don't want to see it, like the ostrich.

I was initially rather charmed by David Cameron, but I think he's revealing himself to be a slightly darker and less charismatic figure than he first appeared. There's a brutality about him.

I like Barack Obama as a person. He's articulate, he knows sports, his brother-in-law's a coach. He always has the athletes to the White House. But I don't know about some of his policies and some of these people in Congress.

Obama may be brilliant, but he's not a leader.

The last time I saw Ted Kennedy was a generation after my first meeting, at the Senate subway below the Capitol on Obama's Inauguration Day. He was his usual gregarious and gracious self - with beaming smile and booming voice wishing my husband and me good luck with our pregnancy and expressing his excitement about the new president.

Obama is a great leader. He can fire people up and get them to do what he wants.

Lincoln would love the fact that Obama is such a great conciliator, trying to transcend ideology.

Growing up, politics never trickled down to the areas we come from. But people from Obama's camp, and Obama himself, reached out to me and asked for my help on the campaign. We've sat and had dinner, and we've spoken on the phone. He's a very sharp guy. Very charming. Very cool.

Obama considers himself above deal-making and back-slapping, political necessities he often delegates to Vice President Joe Biden and other lesser sorts.

It's almost as if Putin is brilliant, really - he's outfoxing Obama all the time.

Do you know what it takes to get a good piece of legislation passed ... one that everyone agrees on? The egos. The turf battles.... It's incredible.

You are living in an unreal world when you work there [the White House.]

Obama has been deliberative to a fault and an inveterate seeker of the middle ground.

Obama's extraordinary political skills suggest he is more than capable of rising above any personal historical grudges he may have inherited.

For Obama, 'rule of law' is merely his political silly-putty.