Ross Douthat Quotes

To me, politics is a pile of tricks.

Professional politicians will say anything, and they're always careful to leave themselves room to turn around and do the other.

I've never met a politician I haven't wanted to walk away from, and I've yet to hear a politician speak and actually believe the words coming out of his mouth.

Bull permeates everything.... American people think politics and politicians are full of baloney.

There's nothing more oily and cynical in politics than telling the truth.

The Democrats want you to think Trump has sold you out and thrown you under the business. They want you to think that Trump has given away his mandate in exchange for doing deals. They want you to believe that Trump loves deals; he loves action.

A politician is required to listen to humbug, talk humbug, condone humbug. The most we can hope for is that we don't actually believe it.

The lie has long since lost its honest function of misrepresenting reality. Nobody believes anybody, everyone is in the know. Lies are told only to convey to someone that one has no need either of him or his good opinion.

Some of my most neurotically fierce bitterness is the result of realizing how untrue people have become.

In the end, the tragedy of Harold Wilson was that you couldn't believe a word he said

Bill Clinton has a brand new book coming out in a few months and the Democrats are worried that the Clinton book might upstage the Kerry campaign. I'm thinking, hell, day-old meat loaf could upstage that campaign.

I think one of the plans the Never Trumpers have if Donald Trump wins is to impeach him.

In the world at large we seldom vote for a principle or a given state of affairs. We vote for a man who pretends to believe in that principle or promises to achieve that state. We don't want a man, we want a condition of peace and plenty-- or, it may be, war and want-- but we must vote for a man.

All imposture weakens confidence and chills benevolence.

Naive' is not a word I associate with the Southern Rule. Superstitious, perhaps, traditional, yes, maddeningly set in their way, certainly but not naive." "I meant you are naive. They must have a hidden motive." "This is why I have no politics," said Darvin. "I can't think in those terms.

There are people who believe everything is sane and sensible that is done with a solemn face. ... It is no great art to say something briefly when, like Tacitus, one has something to say; when one has nothing to say, however, and none the less writes a whole book and makes truth ... into a liar - that I call an achievement.

For the record, I don't expect you to believe any of this. Not really. I'm a liar by trade, after all; albeit, I like to think, an honest liar.

I think Donald Trump believes in democracy and the right to change of power.

The art of politics, under democracy, is simply the art of ringing it. Two branches reveal themselves. There is the art of the demagogue, and there is the art of what may be called, by a shot-gun marriage of Latin and Greek, the demaslave. They are complementary, and both of them are degrading to their practitioners. The demagogue is one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots. The demaslave is one who listens to what these idiots have to say and then pretends that he believes it himself.

I don't think the Democrats should think in narrow tactical terms about mid-term elections.

A lot of times in politics you have people look you in the eye and tell you what's not on their mind.

It is dishonorable to say one thing and think another; how much more dishonorable to write one thing and think another.

I tried to tell them that things would be okay, but I didn't believe it.

I don't think [Bill Clinton] does anything - I don't think it's ill will. I don't think he's evil in the sense that he hates the Bill of Rights. He does what he figures will help him politically.

I think ultimately is, Donald Trump is pragmatic.