L. E. Modesitt Jr. Quotes

My entire adult life has been in military. That's a big part of my life and a big part of why I am the person with the experience to be the United States senator.

President Gerald Ford was no intellectual, but he had served with distinction in combat as a naval gunnery officer and then as Congressman for a quarter century.

I have proudly spent several periods in government, but I'm not a career politician. I come from a family of 'citizen soldiers.'

When I was in the military, my dad ran in the Mike Harris 1995 Common Sense Revolution election, and that's where I really made the decision that one day I would love to run for office.

Before I could become a military officer or a Member of Congress, I was required to do one thing: Take an oath to the Constitution.

While I am not a journalist, I have, myself, written more than one thing that has been plagiarized in the past.

If I think of all the family members, I was probably the only one who was excited with the possibility of my dad's entering public office.

I love politics, love government, and I definitely want to stay involved. But I don't know if I'd ever want to run for office.

I could work with anybody. This is why we need more veterans in Congress.

When you're in the military, you teeter on the edge of that line of life and death. The reason you feel so alive when you come through is because you know you've cheated death - and that and the adrenaline rush is addictive, no question.

Once you run for office, you're in it - sort of like going into the military. You'd better be damned sure it is what you want to do and that the rest of your life is set up to accommodate that. It takes a certain toll on your personality and on your family life. I've seen it personally.

If you're really a good writer and deserve that honored position, then by God, you'll write, and you'll be read, and you'll be produced somehow. It just works that way. If you're just a simple ordinary day-to-day craftsman, no different than most, then the likelihood is that you probably won't make it in writing.

Not writing the same kind of book over and over again is to me the real pleasure of what I do.

Writing offers fairly large rewards to a few successful people, but the rewards come late, and most writers are failures.

I'm a professional. So before I published any novels, I'd always been writing stories.

Throughout his life, General Wesley Clark has stood up to some tough opponents. He battled the Viet Cong, and went toe-to-toe with Slobodan Milosevic. But today the retired four-star general capitulated to the fiercest enemy he's ever confronted: the American voter.

First, there are some of my readers who only read Hap and Leonard, not the other stuff, and some who don't read Hap and Leonard, but a large percentage are crossover readers. And yes, I did refuse to go to Vietnam and it looked like prison was in my future, but they sent me to the psychiatrist and he gave me a 1-Y, which is unfit for military service essentially.

Everybody's born to be different, that's the one thing that makes us the same.

I understand the needs of both the military and the veteran, and that has helped me tremendously as a congressman. I am proud to serve on the House Committee on Veterans Affairs.

I was going to write a book one day and I actually did. To have it is a major accomplishment for me.

I want to do something splendid… Something heroic or wonderful that won’t be forgotten after I’m dead… I think I shall write books.

Young men and women - young men and women signed up to serve in the military to fight terrorism. Hillary Clinton went to Washington to get funds to rebuild her city, and protect first responders but Donald Trump was fighting a very different fight. It was a fight to avoid paying taxes so that he wouldn't support the fight against terror.

If I had engaged in politics, O men of Athens, I should have perished long ago, and done no good either to you or to myself.

I quit law in 1988 to start writing, and it took me 17 years from that point to get a book contract. I guess you can say I was on the slow train.

My father always would say, "My daughter will go into politics? My daughter will become prime minister", but it's not what I wanted to do. I would say, "No, Papa, I will never go into politics." As I've said before, this is not the life I chose; it chose me ... But I accepted the responsibility and I've never wavered in my commitment.