Norman Mailer Quotes

We don't think well of our presidents when they are serving. Even Kennedy, with such a short presidency, was beginning to lose his remarkable appeal to the American people when he was suddenly sainted by death.

Americans like to give their President the benefit of the doubt.

One-fifth of Americans, 20% believe that Barak Obama is, himself, a Muslim and in fact - amongst Republicans that number is almost 40%. Polls show in this country, that the more you disagree with Barak Obama's domestic policies, the more likely you are to think that he is a Muslim.

This is what's so hard about our current politics: things poll well, but people don't believe that politicians are telling the truth.

Things poll well, but people don't believe that politicians are telling the truth. Politicians might mention renewable energy, and the public will think, "That sounds good, but I don't believe they're going to do everything they can to build those towers."

The president's [Donald Trump] approval rating is much higher than the media's approval rating and Congress' approval rating, for that matter.

When you're focused at the task at hand and you believe in the man who is running for president and the man who is running for vice president, we just want it to be objective and fair.

I don't know if Mika Brzezinski intended to be that honest. She's very worried the president intimidating the media is gonna lead to people believing what the president says instead of what the media says, and it's the media's job to control what people think. She used the word "control." She worries that Donald Trump is acing them on this and her fear is rational, but her philosophy is off course, all wet.

Walk around. If you are invisible, the mystique of the President's office may perpetuate inaccurate impressions about you or the President, to his detriment. After all, you may not be as bad as they're saying.

We're looking at two different presidents here if all we have to go on is the media. When Donald Trump is in Washington, D.C., what is he? He is a genuine idiot. He's impolitic, he's uninformed, he's running a chaotic administration where nobody knows what anybody is doing. Whenever they do anything it is disastrous. But the Donald Trump of Washington doesn't exist, because the Donald Trump of Washington is what is reported in the Drive-By Media.

Playing the president is interesting because, unlike a lot of different roles, people pay so close attention to who the president is, all of them, everybody's got an opinion about the president.

I think the Donald Trump's obsession is, is bigger than just polling. I mean it's funny because we've been harping on polls like never before, Trump was harping on his own polls endlessly. I mean his stump speeches would begin with him crowing about his latest poll numbers and that was just a kind of odd convergence.

You know, the bully pulpit that the president has is pretty significant. And I think that one of the things this I've learned in my two and a half years in Congress is the American people want to see us transcend party label and transcend D and R and actually get things done, deliver to the American people, and I think if we were focused on that, we would be seeing a lot more folks happy with what's going on in Washington, D.C.

On March 8 a poll showed Hart 9 points ahead of Reagan. So perhaps 60 million Americans, 55 million of whom had not heard of Hart a month ago, have suddenly decided thay want him to be leader of the free world. The public mind is not just soft wax, it's runny.

Now you may do it badly, you may do it well, some people like you, some people hate you, all the rest of it - but you have got a real motivating life purpose. [on being Prime Minister

Trust me, Wilbur. People are very gullible. They'll believe anything they see in print.

When the President starts talking about something, it makes a difference.

I think that's what's - one of the things that is alarming to me is [Donald] Trump, and I think Trump supporters seem to believe, he won, huge upset, full credit to him, and has got the wind at his back. And Republicans on The Hill do want him to succeed, obviously, and they're deferring to him more than they deep down in private sort of wish - want to, but they are going to defer to him publicly for awhile. But I think that is going to run out faster than people think.

In a new poll 54 percent believed President Bush exaggerated the size of Iraq's missile threat. Hey, he's a guy.

We have to judge presidents not only by the long-term consequences of their actions but also by how they make citizens in their own day feel. One reason that Nixon never succeeded in his comeback campaign is that he had such a negative impact on public trust at the time of his presidency.

A lot of liberals don't believe in American exceptionalism, but it doesn't mean they don't love America.

That peculiarly American religion, President-worship.

The President has so much good publicity potential that hasn't been exploited. He should just sit down one day and make a list of all the things that people are embarrassed to do that they shouldn't be embarrassed to do, and then do them all on television.

I do think that the Trump presidency, even for the resistance, there is pre-Charlottesville and a post-Charlottesville moment, and Donald Trump's response to Charlottesville was a kind of extraordinarily shameful moment, I think, actually for the country.

According to a new poll, 50 percent of Americans think the country is divided. The other 50 percent think it isn't.