Barack Obama Quotes

I was a chairwoman of my state Democratic party.

The Democratic Party hasn't whipped anybody into a frenzy. The assumption is that the people that are marching and protesting and standing up against this don't have enough sense to stand up for their own interests.

The tea party movement has challenged the GOP to get back on track or risk losing its grip on the right wing. It's reminded Democrats that a slick marketing campaign coupled with paid activism isn't the same as a groundswell of real change, and the reason that Democrats are so hostile towards it is because they've never before encountered it.

The American movement, Tea Party, whatever you want to call it, I think that is a very hopeful moment for the country and, I know, we really are the community organizers, are we not?

A lot of people believe, including Howard Dean is looking at this, that the Democratic party demands a full-time chair.

By themselves, they are not enough; we also need to engage in political action.

I went back into politics only when it was clear that things weren't going as they should have in my party. I was always arguing, I argued with everyone - with my father, with the leaders I had known since I was a child...and one day, it was in 1955, one of them exclaimed, 'You do nothing but criticize! If you think you can correct things, correct them. Go ahead, why don't you try?' Well, I could never resist a challenge, so I tried.

Top Democrats laying down their markers for how they'll work with President [Donald] Trump, but who will take on the job of rebuilding the Democratic Party after Tuesday's crushing defeat put Republicans in control of the White House and congress.

African-American women are the most loyal constituency of the Democratic Party, and we need to do more to make sure that we engage them, that we don't take them for granted. We need to be there. And again, I keep thinking about that woman I met in Detroit shortly after my election, who said, "You've got to stop showing up every fourth October and telling me that you care."

You need a Democratic Party which is a grassroots party, which makes decisions from the bottom on up, not just from the top on down.

There're a lot of places that I can serve. And I'm going to serve. I'm going to be fighting to rebuild the Democratic party no matter what. I'm going to be fighting to make sure the Democratic party is known among working people that we are their champion no matter what. So I'm looking for a place to serve.

I think the Tea Party monicker has kind of outlived its use. I think this is just an America movement, I mean, and you and others are really, you know, responsible for igniting this new civic engagement that's very positive.

We must challenge to fight at every level, including Congress and to make that challenge political and to organize as a political party is how we get traction.

Tonight I am going with my wife to a Democratic party, where we're going to...try to be happy.

Being politically active is "more about doing things, not just standing for some platform or being involved in some political party."

I'm not trying to push my political agenda on anybody. I'll do that like any other citizen by giving money to a party or candidate I believe in. I don't mind going out and endorsing somebody I believe in. But when we're talking about my films, I don't think my politics should have anything to do with it.

It's fine to be an activist, but you're not - if you're not putting up candidates, if you're not getting political, if you're not in your party, then you're probably not going to have long-term change. You will probably dissipate.

I think the Democrats have - we really have failed to be in rural America, in the sense of having our leaders spending time talking to folks in rural America. The president Barack Obama has been there, but other than the president and vice president, we have had not a whole lot of conversation in rural America.

The membership survey was a great moment for inner-party democracy. We can't go back, nor do we want to. Our members are pouring their hearts into this campaign. But people don't join the Social Democrats party just to put up posters. They join because they want to help steer the party.

I think one of the tragedies of the civil rights movement was because the civil rights movement became so court-focused, I think that there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing, and activities on the ground, that are able to put together the actual coalitions of power throughout which you bring about redistributive change. And in some ways, we still suffer from that.

The Tea Party thing is only apt in some ways. The activism in the town halls, that looks superficially like it. But what the Tea Party did was, they went after the party, the Republican Party, as their vehicle. And parties is how you change history.

I think his [Bernie Sanders] campaign was good for the Democratic Party, good for our country. And I know how passionate he is about the issues he cares about. So we'll have a long list of matters to discuss when we sit down.

We shall strike. We shall organize boycotts. We shall demonstrate and have political campaigns. We shall pursue the revolution we have proposed. We are sons and daughters of the farm workers' revolution, a revolution of the poor seeking bread and justice.

In coming to Atlantic City, we believed strongly that we were right. In fact, it was just right for us to come to challenge the seating of the regular Democratic Party from Mississippi. But we didn't think when we got there that we would meet people, that actually the other leaders of the Movement would differ with what we felt was right.

I was always a politician from the day the civil rights people chose me as their protest singer.