John Stossel Quotes

We need a president willing to embrace the idea that Washington is not the answer to all, or even most, of our problems, regardless of who is in charge.

I came to see that it wasn't enough just to care about people. You also had to build systems in which you could ensure that there are results and accountability.

There are people inside the administration that think it is their job to save America from the President. That is not their job. Their job is to inject this President into America so that he can explain his views properly and his policies so that we can transform America and drain the swamp and make the system fairer for the middle and lower income people.

People who have been in and around government and politics for their entire lives may no longer be able to see the truth. Our government must be fundamentally reformed. The system has to be changed. Our politics can no longer tinker on the edges.

No reform ever came from the bottom, and it was always people who understood how the ruling class worked who turned out to be the reformers.

We kind of reduce our responsibility to not saying the N-word and to condemning the Klansmen, rather than saying many of our celebrated institutions are systemically racist. Many of our institutions that deal with law enforcement or controlling the bodies of Black people are systemically racist. Many of our educational institutions are systemically racist. Many of our corporate institutions are systemically racist. We don't have those conversations, so things don't change.

It's important to begin to even consider whether countries can become something that looks very different because people tend to take their countries for granted.

We will drain the swamp in Washington, D.C., and replace it with a new government, of, and by, and for the people.

In a dynamic, decentralized system of individual choice and responsibility, people do not have to trust any authority but their own.

We must change the decisions we are making by changing the people who are making them.

People who know the economy is rigged in favor of big money, people who know that our middle class continues to decline and we have to go outside of establishment politics and economics, people who know that we need to reform a broken criminal justice system and we need comprehensive immigration reform.

There is still the illusion that if we could declare corporations are not people or that money is not speech, all would be solved. Regardless of the good in those ideas, it wouldn't.

People have tried all kinds of ways to fix things, like electing Obama and having a debate about decreasing the power of corporations. Then the Supreme Court gives them personhood with the Citizens United decision. You realize that no matter what you do, who you elect, how wonderful your article is, how eloquently you speak on CNN, none of it will make a difference. Ultimately, the only choice is a revolution that pulls off a soft regime change.

The most encouraging sign is that 71 percent of the public believe the system is profoundly corrupted by the power of money. Ninety-six percent of the people believe it's "important" that we reduce the influence of money. Yet 91 percent think it's "not likely" that its influence will be lessened. Think about that: People know what's right to do yet don't think it can or will be done.

I don't see how the people who created the problem can fix it. Texas is worth fighting for, and the best way to fight is to get the politicians out of politics.

every individual can make a difference ... if we continue to leave decision making to the so-called decision makers, things will never change.

Young people are tremendously frustrated because they don't see politics as changing anything. They see it as perpetuating a system that frankly doesn't work and no matter who you vote for things don't really change. Social media is where I think a bold message will wake them up. We saw that a little bit in the Occupy movement. Over the next three years, I think young people are going to wake up and be empowered.

We will never be able to fix a rigged system by counting on the same people who rigged it in the first place.

When you say you want to talk about racial justice, that's not the same as I want to do something about racial justice. Saying I want to hold police accountable is doing something. Saying that I want to take money out of politics, big money, is doing something.

People are fed up - and I think quite rightfully so. But what are they proposing as an alternative to just being upset or feeling disillusioned or abandoned? That kind of protest movement really needs to happen on a much bigger scale, but there needs to be a clearer message.

Most people turn things like elections into a fetish and think it's the only way to go: if we just keep giving people the vote, that'll solve all our problems. In the end, that's just a silly, infantile notion.

I believe that we have a responsibility to make culture available for all people, not only those who can afford to go to the movies.

Even if you don't have the authorities - and frankly I didn't have the authorities for anything - if you take charge, people will follow.

I was raised to be modest to the point of fanaticism. In my family, we don't talk about ourselves to each other. Vanity is considered the worst possible sin. I've gotten better about having to describe things. If you're going to make a record and people are going to write about you, it's your responsibility to answer questions. It's validating - I'm just very clumsy.

You never get involved in the people's lives? The ones you're inhabiting?" I shake my head. "You try to leave the lives the way you found them." "Yeah." "But what about Justin? What made that so different?" "You," I say.