Douglas Tompkins Quotes

I am trying to send directions out and keep control of state government for the final month.

I have a job to do on policy. And I think that's what people want their governor to do. Not politics, policy.

I like to be a strategic policy guy.

In my opinion, the most important thing in governance is management control.

The American people want their presidents to articulate big ideas and leave the details to the eggheads.

George [Mitchell] introduced the idea that we'd go on a retreat [and] to really regularize caucuses. He's the one who had I think [Tom] Daschle become the Democratic Policy Committee chairman, so I think it lived through with Tom.

The mistake that the Bush administration should admit to is not so much that they made the wrong choices. They made the right analysis; they made the right choices. But what they did wrong was the execution of those choices. That was wrong.

The true bureaucrat is a man of really remarkable talents. He writes a kind of English that is unknown elsewhere in the world, and an almost infinite capacity for forming complicated and unworkable rules.

I left the government because I saw the only way to get family planning moving, was to do it outside the government. I was never disillusioned with government.

I think Obama has been skilled and farsighted in a lot of the stuff that he's done. And in other things, unskilled and not farsighted. On balance I'd say that he is doing most of what he said he'd do.

A leader has a sound program, has a good policy, and then brings people together to solve problems.

A certain grasp of military affairs is vital for those in charge of general policy.

I think a quality that a national security adviser must have is the ability to set up procedures.

The reason social media is so difficult for most organizations: It’s a process, not an event.

A major institutional reform is the move away from merely planning, to transforming India. The setting up of NITI Aayog, is a step in this direction.

Few relationships are as critical to the business enterprise as the relationship to the government. Managers have responsibility for this relationship as part of their responsibility to the enterprise itself. It is an area of social impact of the business. To a large extent the relationship to government results from what businesses do or fail to do.

In fact, the most important reforms are those needed, without new laws, at various levels of Government, in work practices and procedures.

Despite the reams of paperwork, obstacles worthy of a horse show, and a wait that can rival an elephant's gestation, adoption feels no different on the inside.

Hillary Clinton has aligned herself with Barack Obama on ISIS, Iran and the economy. It's an alliance doomed to fail. My proven record suggests that - my detailed plans will fortify our national and economic security. And my proven record as governor makes - will give you a sense that I don't make false promises.

My feeling is that anarchists have to think in terms of a specific. I think the dispersal of anarchists all over the place, particularly very gifted ones who can turn out periodicals and do very effective public work, and their tendency to just pick up and take off is a liability.

There may be a difference of the pace at which India moves, but there should be no doubt whatsoever about the direction in which India is going to move in years to come.

Donald Trump's got to do some big changes, because what he was voted on. But when you think about how to do it, it would take massive expertise, which his people, believe me, do not have.

He read reports, examined evidence, and poured more reports up the chain than the Pentagon could read. Nothing short of a human sieve. But in the end he was just one small piece on this game board called war. End of story

"The Donald" is not really a plans guy.

In developing our industrial strategy for the period ahead, we have the benefit of much experience. Almost everything has been tried at least once