Country quotes
20.3K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
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"President Obama is traveling around the country, proposing a stimulus bill that has already failed once. Instead of having an honest discussion about whether or not a plan that already failed once will fail again, the establishment would rather distract the American people with gossip."
"... there is a place in the United States for the Negro. They are real American citizens, and at home. They have fought and bled and died, like men, to make this country what it is. And if they have got to suffer and die, and be lynched, and tortured, and burned at the stake, I say they are at home."
"I think in those countries, including my own in India, where I think primary education has been badly neglected by successive governments, I blame the opposition as much. Why have they allowed the government to get away with it?"
"Even in this secular country, the threat posed by religious fundamentalists is never very far away. Every major religious text exhorts the same principles - that of unyielding obedience to a supernatural being, and renunciation of the intellect and personal aspirations."
"I find that low protein diets often contribute to improvement in patients with immune system problems ... In fact, it would be hard to become deficient in protein in our country even if you tried."
"People think I am unemotional because my voice is flat and a bit boring. It is unfortunate but it is just the way it is. I've tried to change it but it doesn't seem to make a difference. The truth is, I have lots of emotions inside. I cried after the semi-final at Wimbledon [2012] because I was proud to reach the final and I knew how much it meant to the country. I cried after the [losing] final [to Federer], too, for different reasons. I felt I had let people down. I think people warmed to that. They could see how much it hurt."
"I haven't seen - I haven't heard the arguments that would make that case. And I haven't seen a proposal yet that satisfies the objections. The problem is, you create a key like this, and it can't - it's hard to say that it's going to be hidden. And then it becomes used both by our government in multiple cases, but also it could get out as far as hackers are concerned or other countries."
"Novels ought to have hope; at least, American novels ought to have hope. French novels don't need to. We mostly win wars, they lose them. Of course, they did hide more Jews than many other countries, and this is a form of winning."
"Hence, in all countries the chief occupation of society is card-playing, and it is the gauge of its value, and an outward sign that it is bankrupt in thought. Because people have no thoughts to deal in, they deal cards, and try and win one another’s money. Idiots!"
"I know this was the soil on which I was born: but I have nothing to glorify this as my country. I have no pride of ancestry to point back to. Our forefathers did not come here as did the Pilgrim fathers, in search of a place where they could enjoy civil and religious liberties."
"Burma wants to have good relations with our neighboring countries, China and India. I do believe the United States itself wants to live in harmony with China and India. That's why we have to lay down political policies that are fair for everyone."
"They decided to let immigrants in and I am an immigrant. They gave us a chance to participate in this country's life and I took it."
"There are four characteristics which brand a country unmistakably as a dictatorship: one-party rule, executions without trial or with a mock trial for political offenses, the nationalization or expropriation of private property, and censorship. A country guilty of these outrages forfeits any moral prerogatives, any claim to national rights or sovereignty, and becomes an outlaw."
"The concept of individual rights is so prodigious a feat of political thinking that few men grasp it fully - and two hundred years have not been enough for other countries to understand it. But this is the concept to which we owe our lives - the concept which made it possible for us to bring into reality everything of value that any of us did or will achieve or experience."
"You have chosen to risk your lives for the defense of this country. I will not insult you by saying that you are dedicated to selfless service--it is not a virtue in my morality. In my morality, the defense of one's country means that a man is personally unwilling to live as the conquered slave of any enemy, foreign or domestic. This is an enormous virtue."
"... if you love your country why is it necessary to hate other countries?"
"Success, instead of giving freedom of choice, becomes a way of life. There's no country I've been to where people, when you come into a room and sit down with them, so often ask you, "What do you do?" And, being American, many's the time I've almost asked that question, then realized it's good for my soul not to know. For a while! Just to let the evening wear on and see what I think of this person without knowing what he does and how successful he is, or what a failure. We're ranking everybody every minute of the day."
"Are we bereft of citizenship because we are mothers, wives and daughters of a mighty people? Have women no country--no interests staked in public weal--no liabilities in common peril--no partnership in a nation's guilt and shame?"
"If you can imagine the area and the land in Cambodia, I mean there are hardly any roads in big parts of the country. The roads they have, in the rainy season, become just mud. So, if you’re somebody that has just one leg, or blind with no arms and you have children and you’re trying to work, and earn some money, and take care of your home, it’s hard enough to be a parent and do all of that normally."
"I am not one of those who think that the people are never in the wrong. They have been so, frequently and outrageously, both in other countries and in this. But I do say that in all disputes between them and their rulers, the presumption is at least upon a par in favour of the people."
