States are as the men, they grow out of human characters.
Politics is irrational. Politics is about human beings with their frailties and perversions and distortions or perception, who prioritise things according to their conviction.
Biophobia is as much a part of a politician's basic equipment as a sharp suit.
I think I'm becoming a psychologist in explaining the Republican Party. It's the only way you can explain 'em. It's psychological.
I wanted to be a psychological engineer, but we lacked the facilities, so I did the next best thing - I went into politics. It's practically the same thing.
Here's the perversity of Wall Street's psychology: The more Wall Street is convinced that Washington will act rationally and raise the debt ceiling, most likely at the 11th hour, the less pressure there will be on lawmakers to reach an agreement. That will make it more likely a deal isn't reached.
The idea that Americans favor politicians who either remind them of themselves or can imagine what their selves are like because they too have struggled and sung the blues, is, like very best theories of human behavior, immune to falsification by mere evidence.
Most people are Democrats because they hate something; most people are Republicans because they love something.
There is a tragic flaw in our precious Constitution, and I don’t know what can be done to fix it. This is it: Only nut cases want to be president.
Politics is concerned with herds rather than with individuals, and the passions which are important in politics are, therefore, those in which the various members of a given herd can feel alike.
3rd Earl Russell of Kingston
I did not mean that Conservatives are generally stupid; I meant, that stupid persons are generally Conservative. I believe that to be so obvious and undeniable a fact that I hardly think any hon. Gentleman will question it.
So much of politics is about people's relationships with themselves. You do better if you make people feel secure in who they are.
From Mr. [Donald] Trump's perspective, right, he simply heard [Vladimir] Putin compliment him. He then responded by complimenting him. He never thought that he might be being played.
I can't get inside the head of a politician today.
If you read people like say Bruce Blair one of the leading, most sober, knowledgeable specialists, he says, look, [Donald Trump] statements are all over the map, but his personality is frightening, he's a complete megalomaniac.
If you see voters as rational, you'll be a terrible politician. People are not wired to be rational. Our brains simply evolved to keep us alive. Brains did not evolve to give us truth. Brains merely give us movies in our minds that keeps us sane and motivated. But none of it is rational or true, except maybe sometimes by coincidence.
Psychological mapping for political ends is now going to be part of every campaign.
I don't know a lot about politics. I like talking about human behavior. Politicians are funny to me because they often say one thing and behave a different way.
I think the policy makers like the idea of being the boss. I mean people who like to boss other people around like to go into politics so they can become the boss.
It is my settled opinion, after some years as a political correspondent, that no one is attracted to a political career in the first place unless he is socially or emotionally crippled.
Psychology is the only necessary skill for running for president. Trump knows psychology.
I tend to come from a more psychological - that's sort of my passion. I'm interested in the psychology of politics as well - and obviously I'm interested in what's going on in the world - but my passion is more the psychology of people.
A good deal of our politics is psychological.
You can drive yourself crazy trying to peer into a person's soul--or you can do the sensible thing: ask not what inner motives drive a politician's policy choices but instead whether those choices are good for the country.
Who voted for Trump? Who are these people who, as he famously said, would let him shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and still support him? It's people who want too strong a leader, who would do what that leader tells them. Similar to the Europeans following Mussolini and Hitler. There's a streak in humanity that likes that kind of leader. That's Trump's core. Authoritarianism.
