Barack Obama Quotes

Everybody has a say, everybody has a voice, because everyone that comes to the House had about 750,000 people they're representing. And you want those voices heard.

As I said, I spent most of my adult life thinking I didn't have a vote, and therefore that what I thought didn't matter.

It's heartbreaking that so many hundreds of millions of people around the world are desperate for the right to vote, but here in America people stay home on election day.

Look, just go sit at the card table with the rest of the kids and let the adults run the country.

The trouble with modern democracy is that men do not approach to leadership until they have lost the desire to lead anyone.

The elite interests must not crowd out the interests of the citizens.

A democracy is the name of a government of those who are ruling for their own advantage, in opposition to the rich, or to any specific people.

From the standpoint of democratic legitimacy, it's a problem if half the electorate, or close to it, declines to vote, not least because they may not feel much of a stake in the whole process.

We pride ourselves on our democracy, but when you see the way it actually works, I think it is worthy of contempt.

My personal take on politics is I deal with social situations and cultural situations in my music and in my life. I have said on record many times that I haven't voted. I'm not the type of person who says, 'I'm never going to vote.' I think it's clear to me that our system has failed us.

Let us heed the voice of the people and recognize their common sense. If we do not, we not only blaspheme our political heritage, we ignore the common ties that bind all Americans.

I love voting day. I love the sight of my fellow citizens lining up to make their voices heard.

Democracy is not theater - it determines life and death!

Apparently, a democracy is a place where numerous elections are held at great cost without issues and with interchangeable candidates.

If an election is simply a one-day snapshot of transient mass delusions, then this is not a very noble form of government.

If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal.

I want to make democracy work not only for the rich and the well connected but for everyone.

For our white members, voting is something they have done for hundreds of years. But for us, it is not such a traumatic thing, because we have never participated in an election.

All the blood is drained out of democracy - it dies - when only half the population votes.

They have not always elected the best leaders, particularly after a long period in which they have not used this facility of free election. You tend to lose the habit.

In a democracy there are only two types of power: there's organized people and organized money, and organized money only wins when people aren't organized.

I don't really like politics, to be honest. But it's other people making decisions about my life and my country and my child's education... I wish we didn't have so much money in politics, but that's not the world we live in. If we don't play here, we forfeit. And I'm not willing to forfeit my rights.

On the show, we are not trying to get people to eat their vegetables; we are not trying to get people to become Democrats. We are basically trying to encourage people to get involved with public life so that politics isn't left to the wealthy and privileged.

Bad politicians are sent to Washington by good people who don't vote.

El Salvador is a democracy so it's not surprising that there are many voices to be heard here. Yet in my conversations with Salvadorans... I have heard a single voice.