Global Events Quotes

It [the CIA] was not intended as a Cloak & Dagger Outfit. It was intended merely as a center for keeping the President of what was going on in the World…I never wanted the CIA to act as a spy organization. That was never the intention when it was organized.

My generation those who were students in the late 60s was always, in the words of the Who, talking about our generation. That's what we thought of ourselves, as the most important thing since sliced bread. And the "we" that we meant was really the Western Europeans and American generation. And as I think back I suppose I have a sense of guilt on behalf of my generation, a sense that we were terribly provincial and didn't understand the really important stuff that was going on in Eastern Europe.

Now the Americans will realize what we in England have lived through these many years.

When I'm on planes, I'd talk to people and I'd tell them I compete in the X Games. Some would know what it was, but maybe half didn't. But everyone knows about the Olympics. They're really like the X Games for the world!

I've been many times to Dubai and the U.A.E., and I have friends that live there. It would be exciting to stage world heavyweight championship fights in the Arab world. It's something Muhammad Ali achieved when he fought in Zaire or the Philippines. It's absolutely exciting to fight in countries where you have never fought.

The Olympics has solely been around other sports as far as Great Britain has been considered.

Even in the best of times, the United States' ability to influence events in faraway places is limited. The tools we have, from soft power and diplomacy to sanctions and bombing campaigns, are never guaranteed to succeed.

When Seoul hosted the Games in 1988, it became a symbol of the Asian Tigers' ascent onto the world stage. In 1992, the Barcelona Olympics represented the unification of Europe. And when Rio plays host in 2016, it will reinforce the growing importance of Brazil and Latin America as a whole.

Having played in U.S.A. in 1994, in France in 1998, as well as the 2002 World Cup in Korea and Japan - the first on the Asian continent - I have witnessed the excitement and passion unleashed in those different parts of the world.

The Republic-of-China - back in the Olympic Games for the first time

I invested in the 'Globe' because it is one of the best and most important news organizations in the world. We saw this vividly in the days and weeks after the tragic Boston Marathon bombings, and we also see it in many other ways every day.

For the first time in history all people on earth have a common present…. Every country has become the moat immediate neighbor of every other country, and every man feels the shock of events which take place at the other end of the globe.

I wanted to see what was going on in the world. I sometimes think I overwished.

It's super cool - I have this link to Korea, and with the Olympics, I have this opportunity to represent the U.S., Korea, and my family.

What happens in the world affects me. Sometimes, that's part of the writing.

Looking back... it's hard to understand what all the fuss was about as things changed in just a few years. When you look at all the things that have happened in the world, it seems very small.

The world is such a big place, and there's so much that goes on, but a lot of the media really just cover the same thing over and over again.

Al Jazeera is not a tool of revolution. We do not create revolutions. However, when something of that magnitude happens, we are at the center of the coverage.

I do take enormous interest in what's going on. I try to see whatever I can, whenever I can.

Already 2008 has proved a tumultuous year in terms of global perceptions of China, and there are still 59 days to go until the Beijing Olympics. The tragedy of the Sichuan earthquake followed hard on the heels of the riots in Tibet and the demonstrations surrounding the Olympic torch relay.

The main thing that gives me hope is the media. We have radio, TV, magazines, and books, so we have the possibility of learning from societies that are remote from us, like Somalia. We turn on the TV and see what blew up in Iraq or we see conditions in Afghanistan.

If you want to appeal to everyone, you can't do a world tour and expect black people to show up at every date - when you're in Australia, when you're in Dubai, when you're in Indonesia.

I think George H.W. Bush was confronted with some huge challenges - the invasion of Kuwait, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the fall of the Soviet Union - that he managed with great aplomb.

I don't know what you can do if it's reported that there's been a small attack in the second- or third-largest city in country X that you have no connection to. I don't know what you're supposed to feel or how you're supposed to get into that.

I'm interested in politics, what's going on in the world, how people behave and how your life is often in the hands of other people.