Bill Moyers Quotes

The idea of accountability in Vietnam, Nicaragua and now Iraq - the media never has that in its quiver. When you see time after time there is no possibility of Nuremberg [war crime trials], we're doomed to have it repeated.

There is no excuse for this administration shielding information about Iraq and the fact that we have great difficulties there from the American people.

A politician is a fellow who will lay down your life for his country.

We in this Congress have a choice. The American people have a right to exercise a choice on this issue, as to whether our men and women will continue to fight and die in a war based on deception and fantasy, or to start bringing the troops home.

People often ask me how I feel about my invention being used to kill people every day and the AK being a common weapon of ethnic conflicts. I want to make it clear that I created my assault rifle to protect my country. You can blame politicians for its spreading out of control on a global scale.

It doesn't require any particular bravery to stand on the floor of the Senate and urge our boys in Vietnam to fight harder, and if this war mushrooms into a major conflict and a hundred thousand young Americans are killed, it won't be US Senators who die. It will be American soldiers who are too young to qualify for the senate.

There are extremely few places in the world where the citizens believe their political leaders will be punished if they disobey the law.

The Presidency is a four-year contract with the American electorate. But with television news, the American people can more easily monitor that contract, being sure every "i" is dotted and every "t" crossed.

No man ought to be hindered saying or writing what he pleases on the conduct of those who undertake the management of national affairs, in which all are concerned, and therefore have the right to inquire, and to publish their suspicions concerning them. For if you punish the slanderer, you deter the fair inquirer.

The Bush administration should come clean with the American people and admit that they were wrong.

I want my kids to grow up in a country where, you know, we can still shout questions at the president.

If, like me, you believe that your taxes should be spent on your priorities in this country by politicians accountable to you then you should vote to leave the E.U.

I'd request politicians to stop diverting attention from the actual issues that affect the country. Please stop resorting to soft targets like singers and musicians as scapegoats.

I don't really trust politicians, and our job is to call them out. It's old-school journalism.

I feel like throughout history we've heard bullshit from politicians, but now we're at the perfect intersection of technology and entertainment where we can, in real time, produce something that holds people accountable. That's an exciting time to be living in.

We're going to make sure that the people who run for office and get elected are the ones who are going to work for the American people.

Politicians are making deals for their benefit. Now we are going to make the deals for the American people.

Benedict Arnold was a war hero, wounded in battle--before he turned against his country. Hitler was likewise a decorated and wounded veteran of the First World War. Being a war hero is not a lifetime...exempt[ion]...from responsibility for what you do thereafter.

The American way is to criticize and debate openly, not to accept unthinkingly the doings of government officials of this or any other country.

Here's what we [Americans] need: a 30 second you tube video of some guy at a party constantly checking out everyone else at the party, while he pretends to be speaking to the other person. We're the other person. The guy are the politicians. And the distraction is the corruption: We need a Congress that can afford to talk to us. For at least one drink or so.

Today, we're fighting a new war to defend our liberty and our people and our way of life. And as we work to advance the cause of freedom around the world, we remember that the father of our country believed that the freedoms we secured in our revolution were not meant for Americans alone.

The civilization of a country consists in the quality of life that is lived there, and this quality shows plainest in the things that people choose to talk about when they talk together, and in the way they choose to talk about them.

Everybody who aspires to high positions of leadership in their state and in their country should be willing to take unscreened, unrehearsed questions from the people who pay their salary.

Today people can see and protest all the different interests that want war to happen, the people it financially benefits. The First World War wasn't fought for that reason. The Second World War wasn't fought for that reason. Your entire country and way of life could be overtaken.

Coverage of Iraq has plummeted, because people in power no longer want to talk about it suddenly. Journalists should be over there demanding front-page coverage, lead-story coverage every day. They should be demanding that no politician running for federal office can go to bed until they say what the hell they're going to do about Iraq and what how accountable they are for it.