Modernize Quotes & Sayings

Packed with fascinating personal perspective and testimony, Michael Takiffs A Complicated Man wholly justifies its title. The book is far more than a kaleidoscopic oral biography of President Bill Clinton. Aspect by aspect, it guides us through the struggles of postmodern America, as the most ambitious baby boomer of his generation seeks to modernize the Democratic Party-and, as in a Greek drama, is fated to be destroyed. Veritably, an all-American saga, with a cast of thousands-favorable and unfavorable. — Nigel Hamilton

To modernize their sleeping habits, [Peter the Great] declared, 'Ladies and gentlemen of the court caught sleeping with their boots on will be instantly decapitated. — Bob Massie

They sent out notices to all the tribal leaders, and they told us we could have whatever we wanted: Prairie Niggers, if the New Jersey team did not object, Redskins, Savages, Warriors, Heathens, Braves, Bucks - and of course the cheerleaders would be the Squaws, unless we wanted to modernize the language and just call them the Cunts. But — MariJo Moore

Myths are part of our DNA. We're a civilisation with a continuous culture. The effort to modernize it keeps it alive. Readers connect with it. — Amish Tripathi

I think our legal system needs to be developed. Cases of citizens who are detained and then have to wait much too long for a trial - that is scary, for everyone. When someone commits a crime he needs to be charged quickly. Why does this take so long in many cases? I don't know. Is it because our legal system is still rudimentary? China has promised to modernize its legal system. This has high priority. — Zhang Xin

Look, the whole world wants to modernize, and when you look to what they mean by modernizing, they mean Americanize. Would a modern Greek prefer to live in Orange County than Piraeus? Yes. Absolutely. — Rupert Murdoch

Government is not using modern technology so much to modernize and improve services as it is to regulate, punish, collect taxes and keep an eye on us. They'd rather rule than serve. — James Cook

In our haste to modernize under the banner of science, we seem to have gone too far in casting out all mystery and magic from our world. — Denny Sargent

And to bring people together we need a simple and straightforward progressive agenda which speaks to the needs of our people, and which provides us with a vision of a very different America. And what is that agenda? Jobs, Jobs, Jobs. It begins with jobs. If we are truly serious about reversing the decline of the middle class we need a major federal jobs program which puts millions of Americans back to work at decent-paying jobs. At a time when our roads, bridges, water systems, rail, and airports are decaying, the most effective way to rapidly create meaningful jobs is to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure. That's why I've introduced legislation which would invest $1 trillion over five years to modernize our country's physical infrastructure. This legislation would create and maintain at least thirteen million good-paying jobs, while making our country more productive, efficient, and safe. And I promise you, as president I will lead that legislation into law. Trade. — Bernie Sanders

Russia's fundamental problem is not that it is a poor country struggling to modernize, but rather that it is a rich country struggling to modernize. Schoolchildren in the Soviet era were taught that they lived in the richest country in the world. In this case communist propaganda was true — Fareed Zakaria

Building a smarter grid has long been a key part of our government's plan to modernize our energy infrastructure and provide clean, reliable affordable power to consumers. By supporting Ryerson's Centre for Urban Energy we are building a whole new landscape for innovations that will be the backbone for our energy system for future generations. — Bob Chiarelli

WhatsApp provides phone-number-based messaging, and people asked, 'Isn't that what SMS is?' Yes, but SMS is expensive, antiquated, and what WhatsApp did was modernize and level that playing field. For example, in Europe, if France wants to talk to Belgium, it's extraordinary costly because of border and telecom charges. — Brian Acton

Japan's economy had remained strong. So called 'Dutch' learning- useful Western knowledge- was circulating in Japan well before Commodore Perry's arrival. A strong local tradition of banker-merchants and an efficient tax collection system meant that the Japanese economy was not crippled by foreign loans of the kind that banished Egypt, the first non-Western country to modernize, to the ranks of permanent losers in the international economy. — Pankaj Mishra

The Postal Service needs tools to modernize and compete. That is why today I am a cosponsor of H.R. 22, the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act. — Joe Baca

Until Islam can do what Judaism and Christianity have done - question, critique, interpret, and ultimately modernize its holy scripture - it cannot free Muslims from a host of anachronistic and at times deadly beliefs and practices. — Ayaan Hirsi Ali

I never, ever update Mark Twain. I don't modernize it. I let the audience update the material. When I go out on stage, I'm trying to make the audience believe they're looking at this guy who died 104 years ago and listening to him and saying to themselves, "Jesus, he could be talking about today." And that's the point. — Hal Holbrook

There are not as many women who support the national defense budget now as men. I really think there is a gender gap in the support for the large expenditures that are necessary to modernize the force. — Ted Stevens

The sun rarely shines in history, what with the dust and confusion; and when we meet with any cheering fact which implies the presence of this luminary, we excerpt and modernize it. — Henry David Thoreau

The instability in the region is not a result of Israel and the Palestinians. That was never the cause of this instability. Instead, the disfunctionality of many of these societies that have failed to modernize. — Benjamin Netanyahu

One difficulty that people seeking to modernize hymnals and the language of worship inevitably run into is that contemporaries are never the best judges of what works and what doesn't. This is something all poets know; that language is a living thing, beyond our control, and it simply takes time for the trendy to reveal itself, to become so obviously dated that it falls by the way, and for the truly innovative to take hold. — Kathleen Norris

The Japanese keenly learned from Western civilisation in a bid to modernize and preserve the nation. — Akihito

Listen, To be modernize it doesn't mean to be rich in wealth or by status but to be rich in wisdom ... ! — M.H. Rakib

Recommendation 7: Build human capital in government. While Moneyball uses big data and advanced statistics, the endeavor ultimately depends on people. To take one example: rapid-cycle evaluation at a service-delivery agency requires policy experts to identify plausible new approaches; program managers to implement them; technologists to create or modernize data systems to capture effects; social scientists or statisticians to analyze the data on effects; and crosscutting leaders who know how to bring these pieces together with inspiration and precision. — Kelly Ayotte

I started digging and found that Israel signed a peace treaty with the United Arab Emirates after the country had diversified their economy, instead of being solely oil-based. This diversification had brought about modernization. I realized that if you land the price of oil, countries will diversify their economies and as a result, modernize. — Shai Agassi

Now, I know it's a widespread assumption in the West that as countries modernize, they also westernize. This is an illusion. It's an assumption that modernity is a product simply of competition, markets and technology. It is not. It is also shaped equally by history and culture. China is not like the West, and it will not become like the West. — Martin Jacques

This particular one was very, very heartwarming and is the relationship of an older man and a young boy that are essentially on the run. And so yeah, as I say, Barry Crump wrote a lot of books and this one got into the hands of Taika Watiti who then writing the screenplay decided to really vamp up if that's the word, or ramp up and modernize certain phrases - getting in the humor. So he added a lot of a real comedy perspective onto it which is what I think the story needed anyway, especially for it to turn into a film. And it worked. — Rhys Darby

Peter the Great was probably the equal, in dedication, power and ruthlessness, of many of the most successful revolutionary or nationalist leaders. Yet he failed in his chief purpose, which was to turn Russia into a Western nation. And the reason he failed was that he did not infuse the Russian masses with some soul-stirring enthusiasm. He either did not think it necessary or did not know how to make of his purpose a holy cause. It is not strange that the Bolshevik revolutionaries who wiped out the last of the Czars and Romanovs should have a sense of kinship with Peter - a Czar and a Romanov. For his purpose is now theirs, and they hope to succeed where he failed. The Bolshevik revolution may figure in history as much an attempt to modernize a sixth of the world's surface as an attempt to build a Communist economy. The — Eric Hoffer

Few people understand the magnitude of the catastrophe that happened late in the 1980s when the Communist Party had failed to modernize the Soviet Union. — Vladimir Putin

I wanted to modernize music, but more than that, to completely modernize people's attitudes towards life in general. — Roy Harper

In my opinion, the difference between the crusaders and us was a matter of degree. Europe's medieval Catholics claimed their goal was to save Muslims from purgatory; we claimed that we wanted to help the Saudis modernize. — John Perkins

Contrary to what one would expect, it is easier for the advanced to imitate the backward than the other way around. The backward and the weak see in imitation an act of submission and a proof of their inadequacy. They must rid themselves of their sense of inferiority, must demonstrate their prowess, before they will open their minds and hearts to all that the world can teach them. Most often in history it was the conquerors who learned willingly from the conquered. The backward, says de Tocqueville, "will go forth in arms to gain knowledge but will not receive it when it comes to them." Thus the grotesque truculence, posturing, conceit, brazenness, and defiance which usually assail our senses whenever a backward country sets out to modernize itself in a hurry stem partly from the desperate need of the weak for an illusion of strength and superiority if they are to imitate rapidly and easily. — Eric Hoffer

The Republican party does have a lot of work to do. But changing our principles is not a winning strategy. We need to modernize, not moderate. — Bobby Jindal

Since I came to the World Bank in 2007, I have argued that we must 'modernize multilateralism.' — Robert Zoellick

When you automate an industry you modernize it; when you automate a life you primitivize it. — Eric Hoffer

Foreign capital to build new cinemas will help modernize China's aging cinema infrastructure, attract Chinese consumers back into cinemas, and increase demand for U.S. films. — Jack Valenti

The complaint about modern steel furniture, modern glass houses, modern red bars and modern streamlined trains and cars is that all these objets modernize, while adequate and amusing in themselves, tend to make the people who use them look dated. It is an honest criticism. The human race has done nothing much about changing its own appearance to conform to the form and texture of its appurtenances. — E.B. White

If it were my decision, I'd knock the Superdome down. If I couldn't knock it down, I'd just open the roof and gut the whole inside - totally modernize it. If you just dust it off and paint a little bit but don't reimage it, the legacy will be horrible. — Ray Nagin

While I wholeheartedly support finding cost savings through efficiencies in all areas of the federal government, including defense, I will resist any actions that would compromise our nation's qualitative edge when it comes to national defense. It is well known that weakness invites aggression. Threats do not always announce themselves in advance. In order to prepare for unpredictable threats, we must modernize our defense systems. We certainly cannot let them age and deteriorate. — Doug Lamborn

Our intention is to clarify and modernize overtime pay rules, — Elaine Chao

The reason Ataturk, Kemal Ataturk was and is so highly reputed, is he was attempting to modernize ... That's not the right word. Well, it is. For lack of a better way of saying it, he was trying to make Islam compatible with the modern twentieth century world. — Rush Limbaugh

The 1970s 'Wonder Woman' was sort of a kitsch thing. It was a very specific time for that, and it's hard to modernize something like that. — Maggie Q

We did a lot right with the voters with whom we've enjoyed traditional support. But we haven't done enough to build a larger coalition of voters. We have to modernize our message to reach a larger audience of voters beyond our base. — Kevin Madden