David Gergen Quotes
When he hung up on Nancy Reagan, that's when he crossed his final threshold.
Gergen, David. Eyewitness to Power: The Essence of Leadership Nixon to Clinton. Simon & Schuster, 2000, p. 235.
Fox hunting was a sport engaged in only by the very wealthy. The House of Lords tends to represent the views and norms of the British upper classes who engage in Fox hunting. Skinner and the House of Commons wanted to ban Fox Hunting because it is a very cruel sport with dozens of dogs chasing a single fox and often tearing him apart before the riders arrive.
He not only lasted 6 months but he became the most powerful man in the government next to the President, yet he was brutally candid to all including the President. Harry Hopkins was the special assistant to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt through the two great American crises, the Great Depression and World War II. Although he was a social worker with not a shred of political experience, Hopkins was originally selected by the President to operate the national relief program in the midst of the Great Depression. Soon he had spent more money than any human being in history without a taint of scandal. He had never been elected nor was he even ratified by the Senate. He also paid virtually no attention to members of Congress as he became the most successful manager in American Government history. Soon he became FDR’s most important aide. Then he and his wife actually moved into the White House and lived there with the Roosevelts and was a favorite of not only FDR but Eleanor Roosevelt as well.
Eisenhower was referring to MacArthur’s decision, as Army Chief of Staff, to take personal command of infantry, calvary and battle tanks he had ordered assembled to oust the WWI Veterans and their families from the shantytown they had erected in Washington DC to protest the fact that they had not been paid the bonuses that the law required. The attack on the protesting veterans was one of the great disgraces of American history. Eisenhower, knowing full well MacArthur’s penchant for strong attack, thought a more prudent officer should take charge of the delicate operation, and not the heavy-handed, aggressive General. See Quotation 643961.
David Richmond Gergen is an American political commentator and former presidential adviser who served during the administrations of Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, and Bill Clinton. He is currently a senior political analyst for CNN and a professor of public service and the founding director of the Center for Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School. Gergen is also the former editor at large of U.S. News and World Report and a contributor to CNN.com and Parade Magazine. He has twice been a member of election coverage teams that won Peabody awards—in 1988 with MacNeil–Lehrer, and in 2008 with CNN.
