Russia isn't going to start a war. They can't afford it. I think Mr. Putin can be dealt with if we stop screaming at him. You can work with the guy. You just have to know who he is.
— Colin Powell
Diplomacy is listening to what the other guy needs. Preserving your own position, but listening to the other guy. You have to develop relationships with other people so when the tough times come, you can work together.
Children need to get a high-quality education, avoid violence and the criminal-justice system, and gain jobs. But they deserve more. We want them to learn not only reading and math but fairness, caring, self-respect, family commitment, and civic duty.
Our diplomacy and development budget is not just about reducing spending and finding efficiencies. We need a frank conversation about what we stand for as that 'shining city on a hill.' And that conversation begins by acknowledging that we can't do it on the cheap.
Trump just looks stupid trying to appeal to blacks and Latinos.
Trump has no sense of shame.
President Assad, I worked with. I know him reasonably well, met with him a few times, and he's a liar.
As I have done in every election since I started voting so many years ago, I always like to take my time and examine the two candidates, see not only the two candidates but the policies they will bring in, the people they will bring in, who they might appoint to the Supreme Court, and look at the whole range of issues before making a decision.
People have asked me, 'What would you have done if you hadn't gone into the Army?' I'd say I'd probably be a bus driver. I don't know.
When Jerry Springer thinks you've gone too far, my friends, you have gone too far.
It's not just a matter of whether you support Obama or Romney. It's who they have coming with them. I always keep my powder dry, as they say in the military.
If a leader doesn't convey passion and intensity then there will be no passion and intensity within the organization and they'll start to fall down and get depressed.
I think whether you're having setbacks or not, the role of a leader is to always display a winning attitude.
It was the Congress that imposed 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell,' it was certainly my position, my recommendation to get us out of an even worse outcome that could have occurred.
My own experience is use the tools that are out there. Use the digital world. But never lose sight of the need to reach out and talk to other people who don't share your view. Listen to them and see if you can find a way to compromise.
I always like to take my time and examine the two candidates, see not only the two candidates but the policies they will bring in, the people they will bring in, who they might appoint to the Supreme Court, and look at the whole range of issues before making a decision.
It isn't enough just to scream at the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations. We need our political system to start reflect this anger back into, 'How do we fix it? How do we get the economy going again?'
The country would be a lot better off if we stopped having comment sections. And if we got rid of Twitter.
High-quality early-childhood programs and health coverage have expanded, and the number of mentoring relationships for at-risk youth has risen dramatically. That progress is encouraging, but it's not evenly distributed.
We have practiced diplomacy since the very beginning of the nation. Sometimes it has not worked, and we've had to go to war. I always believe you should try to find peace and reconciliation before conflict. That has been the approach I've taken.
Indeed, we're strongest when the face of America isn't only a soldier carrying a gun but also a diplomat negotiating peace, a Peace Corps volunteer bringing clean water to a village, or a relief worker stepping off a cargo plane as floodwaters rise.
There's not going to be a World War III, because there is no one to have World War III with.
Yup, the whole birther movement was racist.
What we have to find is the right level of regulation of our financial system so that it has the incentive to invest in things, but at the same time, it is sufficiently regulated so it can't get in the kind of trouble that we have seen in the past and we have seen recently.
You're not just voting for an individual, in my judgment, you're voting for an agenda. You're voting for a platform. You're voting for a political philosophy.
Engineering didn't take to me. And what saved me and kept me in college was I ran into ROTC cadets who were in a fraternity called The Persian Rifles. And I found my place. I found discipline. I found structure. I found people that were like me and I liked.
In 2008, I spoke out against calling the president a Muslim as if that was a curse. And then in 2012, once again, I was very disturbed about some of the intolerance I was seeing in the party, so I made a statement saying there's a level of intolerance in some parts of the Republican Party. And there was, and I think there still is.
You should see what our Founding Fathers used to say to each other and in the early part of our nation. But what they were able to do, especially in Philadelphia in 1787, four months, they argued about what a House should be, what a Senate should be, the power of the president, the Congress, the Supreme Court. And they had to deal with slavery.
In other words, don't expect to always be great. Disappointments, failures and setbacks are a normal part of the lifecycle of a unit or a company and what the leader has to do is constantly be up and say 'we have a problem, let's go and get it'.
Look at the world. There is no pure competitor to the United States of America.
In terms of the legal matter of creating a contract between two people that's called marriage, and allowing them to live together with the protection of law, it seems to me is the way we should be moving in this country.
When you decide to get involved in a military operation in a place like Syria, you've got to be prepared, as we learned from Iraq and Afghanistan, to become the government, and I'm not sure any country, either the United States or I don't hear of anyone else, who's willing to take on that responsibility.
There are lots of countries that are having these kinds of internal civil wars in other parts of the world and nobody is talking about intervening.
What you're seeing with Occupy Wall Street and the others are people who are unhappy and they're directing their unhappiness now toward Wall Street and toward those they think are doing too well in our society.
You have to make sure you know why you are going to war and then use decisive force to end it as soon as possible.
Standing in support of children is something we should all be able to get behind, regardless of party affiliation.
Throughout my career, I learned plenty about war on the battlefield, but I learned even more about the importance of finding peace. And that is what the State Department and U.S.A.I.D. do: prevent the wars that we can avoid so that we fight only the ones we must.
The idea that putting Americans 'first' requires a withdrawal from the world is simply wrongheaded because a retreat would achieve exactly the opposite for our citizens.
Trump is a national disgrace and an international pariah.
Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer's no. That's not America. Is there something wrong with some seven-year-old Muslim American kid believing that he or she could be president?
Drones are just another weapon, and they turn out to be a very effective weapon that puts no American troops at risk, and I don't see why we shouldn't use them against identified enemy targets.
The Army will take its lessons learned. They're excellent at looking into themselves and reflecting on what did we do right, what did we do wrong.
In the last several years, I have been troubled by the right shift of the Republican party too far to the right.
You need to understand, if you take out a government, take out a regime, guess who becomes the government and regime and is responsible for the country? You are. So if you break it, you own it.
Economy's got to get moving, we've got to get the unemployment rate down. That may be the defining issue of the campaign.
So like any football or basketball coach, you always always believe you're going to win.
Foe means enemy. Now, will we have differences of opinion with the Russians? Yes. Will they get mad at us from time to time, and we get mad at them? That's part of the normal diplomatic relations.
I respect the fact that many denominations have different points of view with respect to gay marriage and they can hold that in the sanctity in the place of their religion and not bless them or solemnize them.
We need to understand that we as citizens and as a government in any community throughout this country have no more important obligation than to educate those who are going to replace us.
I don't know that there is much the United States can do except work with the international community.
