American Nations Quotes & Sayings

In 2010, about six hundred thousand Americans, and more than 7 million humans around the world, will die of cancer. In the United States, one in three women and one in two men will develop cancer during their lifetime. A quarter of all American deaths, and about 15 percent of all deaths worldwide, will be attributed to cancer. In some nations, cancer will surpass heart disease to become the most common cause of death. — Siddhartha Mukherjee

At the General Assembly of the United Nations in New York in 2012, just a fortnight after the murder of the American ambassador in Benghazi, President Obama talked about the YouTube video his administration were then still saying was behind the attacks. Talking about the excerpt ofa film called Innocence of Muslims, the President of the United States said, before the world's assembly, 'The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam.' He didn't say why it 'must not' belong to them any more than it 'must not' belong to the South Park creators who made The Book of Mormon or the ageing Monty Python team who made The Life of Brian. But the question was left to dangle. — Douglas Murray

I don't think we should be engaged in nation-building. It's not our job to turn foreign nations into democratic utopias, to try to turn Iraq into Switzerland. It is the military's job to hunt down and kill our enemies, to kill ISIS before they murder American citizens and they wage jihad. — Ted Cruz

The governments of the Western nations, whether monarchical or republican, had passed into the invisible hands of a plutocracy, international in power and grasp. It was, I venture to suggest, this semi-occult power which ... pushed the mass of the American people into the cauldron of World War I. — J. F. C. Fuller

It was leadership here at home that gave us strong American influence abroad, and the collapse of imperial Communism. Great nations have responsibilities to lead, and we should always be cautious of those who would lower our profile, because they might just wind up lowering our flag. — Ronald Reagan

Is it true that the American people are war-weary? Absolutely. We are tired of sending our sons and daughters to distant lands year after year after year, to give their lives trying to transform foreign nations. — Ted Cruz

The New World Order run by the United Nations ain't gonna happen. Because they've shown their hand, and at least some corner of Congress and the American people are awake to it: they've blown it all. — Michael Moriarty

We are an American family and we rise and fall together as one nation. — Barack Obama

That does not mean we won't experience the tragedy of the loss of some American lives. We will have an opportunity to instill a democracy in Iraq which will be an example and perhaps force other nations in that region to move in the same direction. — John McCain

When we think about millions of hungry children, we don't think about America. We relate the problem to other nations, like Ethiopia, India or Somalia. The sad truth is that one is five American kids is at risk due to poor nutrition. — Kristin Davis

The expansion of this country was accomplished at the cost of decimation to the Native American population. The American Indian death toll due to the United States' march to the Pacific was massive. Much of the land we stole from the Native Americans is uninhabited to this day; basically, the Indians could have stayed where they were. Had America expanded its boundaries yet been true to its conscience, the American Indian nations could have remained intact. And were there a greater prevalence of Native American philosophy and culture in the United States today, the life of our nation would be immeasurably enriched. — Marianne Williamson

If an American is concerned only about his nation, he will not be concerned about the peoples of Asia, Africa, or South America. Is this not why nations engage in the madness of war without the slightest sense of penitence? Is this not why the murder of a citizen of your own nation is a crime, but the murder of citizens of another nation in war is an act of heroic virtue? — Martin Luther King Jr.

Unlike the Afghans and Iraqis, the South Korean people solidly supported the American military presence, which was part of a United Nations operation. — John Eisenhower

The American taxpayer should not be treated more shabbily than debtors from other nations and we should be encouraging other nations to help rebuild Iraq's economy. — Hillary Clinton

Nonetheless, there is one important way that American nationalism does closely resemble German nationalism. Since shortly after the republic's founding, Americans have nurtured a very strong belief that the United States is a special nation, destined not only to take its place among nations but also to be the exemplar of what nationhood should be. — Brian E. Fogarty

[Lloyd George] said that Harding 's speech on American naval aspirations made him feel that he would pawn his shirt rather than allow America to dominate the seas. If this was to be the outcome of the League of Nations propaganda, he was sorry for the world and in particular for America. — David Lloyd George

My sense is that jurists from other nations around the world understand that our court occupies a very special place in the American system, and that the court is rather well regarded in comparison, perhaps, to their own. — Sandra Day O'Connor

I am ... willing to make it clear that American foreign policy must uphold the sanctity of international treaties. That is the cornerstone on which all relations between nations must rest. — Franklin D. Roosevelt

It's not Americans I find annoying; it's Americanism: a social disease of the postindustrial world that must inevitably infect each of the mercantile nations in turn, and is called 'American' only because your nation is the most advanced case of the malady, much as one speaks of Spanish flu, or Japanese Type-B encephalitis. It's symptoms are a loss of work ethic, a shrinking of inner resources, and a constant need for external stimulation, followed by spiritual decay and moral narcosis. You can recognize the victim by his constant efforts to get in touch with himself, to believe his spiritual feebleness is an interesting psychological warp, to construe his fleeing from responsibility as evidence that he and his life are uniquely open to new experiences. In the later stages, the sufferer is reduced to seeking that most trivial of human activities: fun. — Trevanian

The UN lacked the ability to act without the support of its more powerful members, notably the United States. The American government wanted to avoid a repetition of its unsuccessful intervention in Somalia, in which thirty American troops were killed. President Clinton issued a directive on UN military conditions. The operations would also have to be directly relevant to American interests. These conditions excluded American support for UN intervention to stop the genocide [in Rwanda]. — Jonathan Glover

The Lord shall have made his American Israel high above all nations which he hath made. — Ezra Stiles

The tribunal here and your American newspapers talk so much about our sharp Nazi methods, but do you realize that within the past year, since the defeat of Germany, 1 million Germans have been evicted from what was originally German territory and which has now been given to Poland? No League of Nations or other body intervened. — Alfred Rosenberg

As the highest ranking American official in the United Nations organization, I came to understand thoroughly that the national constitutional processes of the member states define the status of territories under their sovereignty. — Dick Thornburgh

This is American leadership at its best. We stand with people who fight for their own freedom, and we rally other nations on behalf of our common security and common humanity. — Barack Obama

The United Nations charter gives every nation the right to self defence, therefore when the American embassies were bombed it was a matter of time before the Americans responded by going for what they suspected were the causes of the attack. — Benazir Bhutto

United States and Coalition forces will remain in Iraq and will operate under American command as part of a multinational force authorized by the United Nations. — Jim Gerlach

We are not only a Latin American nation, we are an Afro-American nation also. — Fidel Castro

Since Franklin Roosevelt's leadership in setting up the United Nations and the Nuremberg trials, the U.S. has promoted universal legal norms and the institutions to enforce them while seeking, by hook or by crook, to exempt American citizens, especially soldiers, from their actual application. — Michael Ignatieff

But the origin of the American Republic is distinguished by peculiar circumstances. Other nations have been driven together by fear and necessity-the governments have generally been the result of a single man's observations; or the offspring of particular interests. In the formation of our constitution, the wisdom of all ages is collected-the legislators of antiquity are consulted-as well as the opinions and interests of the millions who are concerned. In short, it is an empire of reason. — Noah Webster

I am the living attestation of the American dream. I am the extolment of this great nation. — Don King

Conservatives believe that international institutions such as the United Nations are anti-American and anti-Israeli cabals. Progressives do not like the economic medicine that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank force down the throats of developing countries. — Michael Ignatieff

One out of every 100 American men is HIV positive. The rate of infection has reached epidemic proportions in 40 developing nations. — Philip Emeagwali

Since 2001, the U.S. government has abandoned its role as a champion of human rights and has perpetrated terrible and illegal abuses in prisons in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, sent prisoners secretly to other nations to be tortured, denied the applicability of the Geneva Convention restraints, and severely restricted time-honored civil liberties within our own country. Certain political leaders of other nations, who are inclined to perpetrate human rights abuses to quiet dissenting voices and were previously restrained by positive influence from Washington, now feel free to emulate or exceed the abuses approved by American leaders. — Jimmy Carter

The amount of U.S. debt held by countries such as China and Japan is at a historic high, with foreign investors holding half of America's publicly held debt. This dependence raises the specter that other nations will be able to influence our policies in ways antithetical to American interests. — Evan Bayh

We are one people despite the ostensible rifts, cracks, and differences between the American and Soviet democracies. We are one people and it is not in our interests that the West should liberate the East, for in doing this and in liberating the enslaved nations, the West would inevitably deprive Jewry of the Eastern half of its world power. — Chaim Weizmann

Marcia Wilson was a good example of Omega's core strategy for creating a New World Order. It involved placing their people, or moles, in positions of power within the CIA, the NSA, the Pentagon, the White House and global organizations like the UN, the IMF and the World Bank. This enabled Omega to pull some of the strings of these organizations and to direct American, and world politics, to an extent. — James Morcan

I once walked through an exhibit in a large American museum that displayed First Nations artifacts in old dioramas, with mannequins that hadn't been changed since the 19th century. — Susanna Kearsley

An Englishman, methinks,
not to speak of other European nations,
habitually regards himself merely as a constituent part of theEnglish nation; he is a member of the royal regiment of Englishmen, and is proud of his company, as he has reason to be proud of it. But an American
one who has made tolerable use of his opportunities
cares, comparatively, little about such things, and is advantageously nearer to the primitive and the ultimate condition of man in these respects. — Henry David Thoreau

The United States-Israeli relationship is based on the broadest conception of American national interest in which our two nations are bound forever together by common democratic values and traditions. This will never change. — Colin Powell

I'm a member of the American Indian Movement, and I'm from the indigenous nations of the Western Hemisphere. — John Trudell

I want to share with the American people that President Bush and the Republican majority in just 4 years have borrowed $1.05 trillion from foreign nations. That is selling our country to other nations because of the spending that is going on. — Kendrick Meek

The last line of Hawaii's Story by Hawaii's Queen is addressed to the American people and their congressmen. "As they deal with me and my people, kindly, generously, and justly, so may the Great Ruler of all nations deal with the grand and glorious nation of the United States of America." It's clever to imply that if the U.S. swallows up her little country, God will smite it. As I reread the last sentance of a book written by a Hawaiian queen wh was taught to read and write by American missionaries, her final thought seems emblematic of how hierarchical Hawaiians adapted to Christianity. Jehovah, "the Great Ruler of all nations," is the highest high chief in the universe. — Sarah Vowell

I have a simple answer to any American patriot who claims that there is no conflict between his love of country and his desire to hitch our fate to the United Nations: "You're mistaken." And, therefore, I'm thinking of adding this corollary to my General Rule of patriotism: The more intellectually consistent and pro-U.N. you are, the less patriotic you are likely to be. I haven't thought that all the way through, but it seems right to me. — Jonah Goldberg

The American Dream that has lured tens of millions of all nations to our shores in the past century has not been a dream of material plenty, though that has doubtlessly counted heavily. It has been a dream of being able to grow to fullest development as a man and woman, unhampered by the barriers which had slowly been erected in the older civilizations, unrepressed by social orders which had developed for the benefit of classes rather than for the simple human being of any and every class. — James Truslow Adams

As I drew a still fresher soil about the rows with my hoe, I disturbed the ashes of unchronicled nations who in primeval years lived under these heavens, and their small implements of war and hunting were brought to the light of this modern day. — Henry David Thoreau

In Iraq and Syria, American leadership - including our military power - is stopping ISIL's advance, instead of getting dragged into another ground war in the Middle East, we are leading a broad coalition, including Arab nations, to degrade and ultimately destroy this terrorist group. — Barack Obama

The United States of America is still run by its citizens. The government works for us. Rank imperialism and warmongering are not American traditions or values. We do not need to dominate the world. We want and need to work with other nations. We want to find solutions other than killing people. Not in our name, not with our money, not with our children's blood. — Molly Ivins

Nations need to constantly reaffirm their historical roots to maintain their political ideals. Motion pictures were one of the media used by nations to accommplish this task. The question one must ask is: Did the colonial films made faithfully represent the period in our nation's history? — John P. Harty Jr.

Cynicism and naivety lie cheek by jowl in the American imagination; if the United States is one of the most venal nations on Earth, it is also one of the most earnestly idealistic. — Terry Eagleton

The infant periods of most nations are buried in silence or veiled in fable; and the world perhaps has lost but little which it needs regret. The origin and outset of the American Republic contain lessons of which posterity ought not to be deprived: and happily there never was a case in which every interesting incident could be so accurately preserved. — James Madison

If the United States marches into Iraq without the backing of the United Nations, that will be done entirely without the backing of the American people. — Richard Gere

Hanging a banner from the front of the Bureau of Indian Affairs building that proclaimed it to be the "Native American Embassy," hundreds of protesters hailing from seventy-five Indigenous nations entered the building to sit in. BIA personnel, at the time largely non-Indigenous, fled, and the capitol police chain-locked the doors announcing that the Indigenous protesters were illegally occupying the building. The protesters stayed for six days, enough time for them to read damning federal documents that revealed gross mismanagement of the federal trust responsibility, which they boxed up and took with them. The Trail of Broken Treaties solidified Indigenous alliances, and the "20-Point Position Paper,"14 the work mainly of Hank Adams, provided a template for the affinity of hundreds of Native organizations. Five years later, in 1977, the document would be presented to the United Nations, forming the basis for the 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. — Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz

An American, a soldier of fortune by profession. Wherever there is trouble in the world the Dwights of all nations foregather. There are not very many of them, thirty or forty perhaps, and they are all supremely competent men because the others have been killed. — Nevil Shute

Unfortunately, most scientists were radicals, socialists, and liberals. There was hardly a conservative among them. And they believed that the truths discovered by science were for humankind to share, and should never be kept secret in the service of one regime or country. So while the American government was keeping this huge project top secret, the scientists held discussion groups about sharing nuclear technology with all the nations of the world. Oppie himself was suspect: the only reason he was not in the Communist Party was that he never joined clubs. — Ken Follett

Traditional people of Indian nations have interpreted the two roads that face the light-skinned race as the road to technology and the road to spirituality. We feel that the road to technology ... has led modern society to a damaged and seared earth. Could it be that the road to technology represents a rush to destruction, and that the road to spirituality represents the slower path that the traditional native people have traveled and are now seeking again? The earth is not scorched on this trail. The grass is still growing there. — William Commanda

These men of many nations must be taught American ways, the English language, and the right way to live. — Henry Ford

The system - the American one, at least - is a vast and noble experiment. It has been polestar and exemplar for other nations. But from kindergarten until she graduates from college the girl is treated in it exactly like her brothers. She studies the same subjects, becomes proficient at the same sports. Oh, it is a magnificent lore she learns, education for the mind beyond anything Jane Austen or Saint Theresa or even Mrs. Pankhurst ever dreamed. It is truly Utopian. But Utopia was never meant to exist on this disheveled planet. — Phyllis McGinley

When it comes to cyber warfare, we have more to lose than any other nation on earth. The technical sector is the backbone of the American economy, and if we start engaging in these kind of behaviors, in these kind of attacks, we're setting a standard, we're creating a new international norm of behavior that says this is what nations do. This is what developed nations do. — Edward Snowden

And a few months later, an opinion poll found that 54 percent of the American people wanted the United Nations to become a world government with power to control the armed forces of all nations, including the United States. — Eric Schlosser

Since 1877 the driving force of American politics hasn't primarily been a class struggle or tension between agrarian and commercial interests, or even between competing partisan ideologies, although each has played a role. Ultimately the determinative political struggle has been a clash between shifting coalitions of ethnoregional nations, one invariably headed by the Deep South, the other by Yankeedom. — Colin Woodard

Like all other self-respecting peoples, we have no intention of paying our debts. Or, to be more nearly accurate, the capitalists who expect to exploit us " for all time and eternity " have no intention of permitting us to pay our debts. They trump up new schemes to cause us to go more deeply into their debt. They intoxicate us with the strong fumes of "world power." They tell us how fine a thing it is to be reckoned among the great nations of the world. They cause us to maintain great military establishments and to build more and greater dreadnoughts. Thirty years ago we spent almost nothing on the navy and little more on the army. Now we are spending $300,000,000 a year on the army and navy. Almost a million dollars every week-day. Sixty-five cents of every dollar that is raised by the American government by taxation is spent for wars past or to come - for pensions, battleships or soldiers. — Anonymous

Both the American people and nations that censor the internet should understand that our government is committed to helping promote internet freedom. — Hillary Clinton

Most Americans have no memory of the designs Franklin Roosevelt's New Dealers had for postwar-American foreign policy. Human rights, self-determination and an end to European colonization in the developing world, nuclear disarmament, international law, the World Court, the United Nations - these were all ideas of the progressive left. — Kai Bird

If it is widely assumed that the new President cannot move forward simply because of a narrow victory, there can easily develop a sense of unease and uncertainty, adversely affecting every sector of American society, our economy and the perception of other nations. — Richard V. Allen

I cannot see that any rational American ... could conceivably try to fulfill the major national purposes of the United States through the United Nations. It would be comparable to the United States seeking to pass its legislation through the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. — Charles Lichenstein

More than 95 percent of both legal and illegal immigration into the United States is non-white. Because of the way immigration law is structured, the highest-skilled nations on earth - those of Europe - are allowed only a tiny percentage of immigrants, while the third world nations such as Mexico are dumping their chaff onto American shores at the highest rate in history. — David Duke

Compared with members of other nations of Western civilization, the ordinary American is a rationalistic being, and there are close relations between his moralism and his rationalism. Even romanticism, transcendentalism, and mysticism tend to be, in the American culture, rational, pragmatic and optimistic. — Gunnar Myrdal

partner, and before that, worked with Rachel as iCrossing's vice president of corporate strategy. Noah has consulted for organizations as diverse as the Inter-American Development Bank, Oxford Analytica, and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), for which he was appointed to chair the first ministerial meeting on information and communication technology (ICT) for development — Rachel Pasqua

The chief instrument of American statistics is the census, which should accomplish a two-fold object. It should serve the country by making a full and accurate exhibit of the elements of national life and strength, and it should serve the science of statistics by so exhibiting general results that they may be compared with similar data obtained by other nations. — James A. Garfield

It is in the American interest to put an end to Nationhood. That is the goal in global government. America must get out of the United Nations or our sovereign Republic will not survive. — Walt Whitman Rostow

In selling his scheme, Obama has been promoting the myth that our system is no better than those of other advanced nations. His recent statements have betrayed his openly contemptuous attitude toward American health care and out top-flight medical profession. His attitude is consistent with his revealed general attitude about America, which he denigrates every time he gets a chance, especially on foreign soil. — David Limbaugh

If we would reach a degree of civilization higher and grander than any yet attained, we should welcome to our ample continent all nations, kindreds [sic] tongues and peoples; and as fast as they learn our language and comprehend the duties of citizenship, we should incorporate them into the American body politic. The outspread wings of the American eagle are broad enough to shelter all who are likely to come. — Frederick Douglass

Finally, a prominent nation is taking on the homosexual agenda and rejecting it outright. A number of African nations have done the same, but third-world countries are not newsworthy to mainstream media. The irony is stunning that a Communist nation would understand that preserving the value of men and women marrying and producing children makes for demographic survival, while many American Christian leaders cower in the shadows, in fear of activist homosexuals and their leftist supporters. I say 'cheers' to the Russians on this one. That nation will probably outlive America. — Sylvia Thompson

Civilization does not engross all the virtues of humanity: she has not even her full share of them. They flourish in greater abundance and attain greater strength among many barbarous people. The hospitality of the wild Arab, the courage of the North American Indian, and the faithful friendships of some of the Polynesian nations, far surpass any thing of a similar kind among the polished communities of Europe. — Herman Melville

The emphasis on technology over an understanding of the realities of war and conflict reflect[s] the ahistoricism not only of too much of the U.S. military officer corps, but of the American educational system as well. Our mistakes in Iraq and Afghanistan were the result of a pervasive failure to understand the historical framework within which insurgencies take place, to appreciate the cultural and political factors of other nations and people, and to encourage the learning of foreign languages. In other words, in Afghanistan and Iraq we managed to repeat many of the mistakes we made in Vietnam, because America's political and military leaders managed to forget nearly every lesson of that conflict. — Peter R. Mansoor

The only thing I hope for is that, regardless of what the outward world is for different people, different nations, I hope their internal world is similar. And if I, hopefully, have managed to somehow describe my inner world in this book, all I count on is that it will have some resonance among the American readers, or, at the very least, the American readers will treat this book as a kind of a guidebook for my inner world, strange as it may appear. — Vera Pavlova

We spend more per pupil than any other country, but among industrialized nations, American students rank near the bottom in science and math. Only 13 percent of high school seniors know what high school seniors should know about American history. — Glenn Beck

American and Israel share a special bond. Our relationship is unique among all nations. Like America, Israel is a strong democracy, a symbol of freedom, and an oasis of liberty, a home to the oppressed and persecuted. — William J. Clinton

The idea of labor, of hard work, leading to increased productivity was so novel, so radical, in the overall span of Western history that most ordinary people, most of those who labored, could scarcely believe what was happening to them. Labor had been so long thought to be the natural and inevitable consequence of necessity and poverty that most people still associated it with slavery and servitude. Therefore any possibility of oppression, any threat to the colonists' hard earned prosperity, any hint of reducing them to the povery of other nations, was especially frightening; for it seemed likely to slide them back into the traditional status of servants or slaves, into the older world where labor was merely a painful necessity and not a source of prosperity. — Gordon S. Wood

We are first among the nations in per capita giving: it would take three Frenchmen, seven Germans, or fourteen Italians to equal the charitable donations of one American. — Parker J. Palmer

Regime change has been an American policy under the Clinton administration, and it is the current policy. I support the policy. But regime change in and of itself is not sufficient justification for going to war
particularly unilaterally
unless regime change is the only way to disarm Iraq of the weapons of mass destruction pursuant to the United Nations resolution. — John F. Kerry

We hold that the ownership of private property is the right and privilege of every American citizen and is one of the foundation stones upon which this nation and its free enterprise system has been built and has prospered. We feel that private property rights and human rights are inseparable and indivisible. Only in those nations that guarantee the right of ownership of private property as basic and sacred under their law is there any recognition of human rights. — John Rarick

In the mighty and almost limitless potential of American industry-the brilliance and rugged determination of its leaders; the skill, energy and patriotism of its workers-there has been welded an almost impregnable defense against the evil designs of any who would threaten the security of the American continent. It is indeed the most forceful and convincing argument yet evolved to restrain the irresponsibility of those who would recklessly bring down upon the good and peace-loving peoples of all the nations of the earth the disaster of total war. — Douglas MacArthur

Some segments within the American government orchestrated the attack to reverse the declining American economy, and its grips on the Middle East, in order to save the Zionist regime The majority of the American people as well as most nations and politicians around the world agree with this view. — Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

Until we can fully grasp the extent of corruption and fraud involved in the administration of the Oil-for-Food program, and until the United Nations decides to cooperate in the investigation, no American taxpayer dollars should go to the United Nations. — John Ensign

Crisis' seems to be too mild a word to describe conditions in countless African-American communities. It is beyond crisis when in the richest nation in the world, African Americans in Harlem live shorter lives than the people of Bangladesh, one of the poorest nations of the world. — Johnnetta B. Cole

There are more of you and he than you can probably imagine, but most are ashamed and seek to disappear in the foliage of American life. But your numbers are growing, and democracy gives you the best chance of finding your voice. Here you can learn how not to be torn apart by your opposing sides, but rather to balance them and benefit from both. Reconcile your divided allegiances and you will be the ideal translator between two sides, a goodwill ambassador to bring opposing nations to peace! — Viet Thanh Nguyen

American books reflect our common heritage with many other nations and their influence upon our culture. The influences are endless, linking us with the rest of the world. Thus, they are good ambassadors for us. — Robert Kennedy

you know how I feel about the United Nations. From the beginning, it's functioned as a one-world-order organization whose sole function is to look down its collective nose at the one nation that funds it, the United States. The UN has advocated the transfer of wealth out of the United States, the elimination of international borders, the establishment of a single global currency, international gun control, and the elimination of American jobs. It's become a friendly forum for radical and scientifically absurd ideas like global warming and has advocated cockamamie international tax schemes like cap-and-trade. It has done everything it can to end the sovereignty of the United States. — Don Brown

Let us remember that the main purpose of American aid is not to help other nations, but to help ourselves. — Richard M. Nixon

The United Nations has long sought the ability to raise revenues in this manner as a means of reducing its reliance on American and other member nations' dues to sustain the UN's operations. — Frank Gaffney

Governments of rich countries spend some $6bn of tax money a year on disaster relief and development aid overseas, while each new earthquake, famine or tidal wave can attract 1,000 aid organisations, from the United Nations Children's Fund and Oxfam to the 'Jesus Brigades' of the American south and other charitable adventurers. — James Buchan

Some cultures, for instance, are collectivist; others are individualistic. Collectivist cultures, like Japan and other Confucian nations, value social harmony more than any one person's happiness. Individualistic cultures, like the United States, value personal satisfaction more than communal harmony. That's why the Japanese have a well-known expression: "The nail that sticks out gets hammered down." In America, the nail that sticks out gets a promotion or a shot at American Idol. We are a nation of protruding nails. — Eric Weiner

The number of individuals who know how to make a can of Coke is zero. The number of individual nations that could produce a can of Coke is zero. This famously American product is not American at all. Invention and creation is something we are all in together. Modern tool chains are so long and complex that they bind us into one people and one planet. — Anonymous

The American people, and the citizens of all Western nations, have the right to know about every single thing their representatives do on their behalf. After all, elected officials are merely representing those who hold the true power (the people). — James Morcan

The future was and remains the quintessential American art form. Other nations sit back and let their futures happen; we construct ours. We can let the future happen, or take the trouble to imagine it. We can imagine it dark or bright-and in the long run, that's how it will be. — David Gelernter

The European powers had been anxious to see the United States become embroiled in a civil war and eventually break into two smaller and weaker nations. That would pave the way for their further colonization of Latin American without fear of the Americans being able to enforce the Monroe Doctrine. — G. Edward Griffin

Some of the men were dressed like Peter and wore red plaid hunting jackets or bulky tan Carhartt jackets or lined flannel shirts, and all of those men were wearing jeans and work boots. Some of the men wore ski jackets and hiking boots and the sort of many-pocketed army green pants that made you want to get out of your seat and rappel. Some of the men wore wide-wale corduroy pants and duck boots and cable0knit sweaters and scarves. It was a regular United Nations of white American manhood. But all the men, no matter what they were wearing, were slouching in their chairs, with their legs so wide open that it seemed as though there must be something severely wrong with their testicles. — Brock Clarke

It is not until one visits old, oppressed, suffering Europe, that he can appreciate his own government, "he observed, "that he realizes the fearful responsibility of the American people to the nations of the whole earth, to carry successfully through the experiment ... That men are capable of self-government. — Doris Kearns Goodwin

Judge candidly what a wretched figure the American empire will exhibit in the eye of other nations, without a power to array and support a military force for its own protection. — Oliver Ellsworth