John Kerry Quotes

Indeed, Britain was set to repeat the old, familiar cycle of boom and bust. Since then, we have created and rigorously adhered to a new framework of modern economic management

I've never seen people as physically distraught as the Bush administration team was because of what was happening to the economy. I personally believe that the steps that President Obama took saved the economy. He doesn't get the credit he deserves for taking some very hard positions. But it was a terrible recession. So now we've dug ourselves out of it, we're standing, but we're not yet running.

70 to 80 percent of country economy is controlled by the Bolivian state, and the other percentage by the private sector. We admit that it's legal, constitutional, that the private sector is entitled to its own economy, but to ensure these profound changes that clearly this government is promoting, including profound changes in the food industry, what we are doing is an important step.

There's a certain amount of sympathy here for the Bush administration's problem, which is they would like to get rid of Saddam Hussein and they would like to have the Kurds autonomous.

If the Americans go in and overthrow Saddam Hussein and it's clean, he has nothing, I will apologize to the nation, and I will not trust the Bush administration again.

It would probably strike the average politician as absurd to argue that the best way to fix the economy is to stop trying to 'fix it.'

It is vital that we get these policies right as we take forward our plans to drive down the deficit and transform our economy.

The first weekend after the attacks of September 11, George W. Bush had a meeting at Camp David with his top advisors, including Colin Powell, the secretary of state. And there was a lively debate about Iraq policy, in which some people from the Pentagon were arguing that the war against terrorism should include Saddam Hussein.

It was pretty clear in 2002 to anyone in the intelligence community that is where we were headed.[To war with Iraq].

I was fortunate, I guess, to be part of some good fiscal discipline in the Bush administration. The budget I put forward was a balanced budget.

Many respected economists and statesmen believe our national debt is neither unwieldy nor a dangerous burden on the country. The trouble is that a vast majority of the American people think otherwise.... It violates basic American ideas of thrift and money management. These strong public feelings cannot be ignored forever.

By the way on economics, South Carolina is an example to the country of what we should be doing as Americans. This country has a vast manufacturing base. It is growing in manufacturing where America is shrinking and it's because they have reduced taxes and lower regulatory burdens and been pro-business.

It was President [Bill] Clinton and the United States congress in 1998 which said that the regime has to be changed because the regime would not give up its weapons of mass destruction. We came into office in 2001 and kept that policy because Saddam Hussein had not changed.

I really am tired of all the Clinton Democrats running around getting all-sanctimonious over Iraq. It was them who killed 1.5 to 2.2 million Iraqis through sanctions. Sanctions that Madeline Albright, their illustrious Secretary of State, when confronted with the fact of 500,000 dead Iraqi children, said it was a price she was willing to pay.

I think it was seen as a symptom that the Chinese leadership may be really scared about their economy.Why would you want to depend more on exports if you're a country that has a stated policy of relying less on exports and more on consumer spending, domestic spending?

It is a set of policies formulated between 15th and 19th streets by the U.S. Treasury, and World Bank. Countries should focus on stabilization, liberalization, privatization.

But let's not assume that trade is the only challenge we have in the economy. I think it is a part of it, and I've said what I'm going to do.

This country right now owes $19 trillion. And they need somebody like me to straighten out that mess.

In most circles, the idea of economic planning has been in disrepute most of the time and, particularly in America, has almost carried connotations of intellectual and moral perversion and even political subversion.

In the past six months, our federal government has devised a dozen strategies to save America's financial markets. Each plan has been more costly, more risky, and less aligned with the principles of our country's free market economy than the last. I am disappointed to say that this latest plan puts all the rest of them to shame.

It is important to combine structural reforms and good fiscal stewardship with a growth strategy, because when your economy's growing and more revenue's coming in, that helps relieve debt.

Most countries choose to have government run the economy.

The budget idea, I may admit, is a sort of obsession with me. I believe in budgets. I want other people to believe in them. I have had a small one to run my own home; and besides that, I am the head of the organization that makes the greatest of all budgets, that of the United States Government. Do you wonder, then, that at times I dream of balance sheets and sinking funds?

In his speech President Bush said we need to rebuild Iraq, provide the people with jobs, and give them hope. If it works there maybe we'll try it in New Orleans.

Even after the whole democratization process, it's quite clear that the United States are not seen in a positive way in all the Muslim-majority countries - in Egypt, in Libya, even in Tunisia - even though we have now a kind of trying to be recognized as democrats by the Islamists who are running, you know, Tunisia and Egypt. But the popular sentiment is very, very negative.