President And Character Quotes & Sayings

As we celebrate President Reagan's remarkable career and historic legacy, we also celebrate a man of strong character, deep conviction, unforgettable charm, and wonderful wit. — Jim Ramstad

One of the most important virtues of the American character is our ability to approach the complexities that life presents us with common sense and decency, .. The considered judgment of the American people is not going to rise or fall on the fine distinctions of a legal argument but on straight talk and the truth. It is time for the president and the Congress to follow that common sense for the good of the country. — Dick Gephardt

The Congress of the United States, in recognition of the unique contribution of the Bible in shaping the history and character of this Nation, and so many of its citizens, has by Senate Joint Resolution 165 authorized and requested the President to designate the year 1983 as the 'Year of the Bible.' — Ronald Reagan

And it would be a bit out of character. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan may have started out as a reformer, but he really enjoys being seen as a larger-than-life tough-guy figure. He doesn't go on photographed hunting expeditions, for instance. But he does have hero moments, such as when his convoy stopped in the middle of the Bosphorus Bridge and he allegedly talked down a jumper, prevented him from committing suicide. — Peter Kenyon

As Truman saw the presidency, the chief responsibility was to make decisions and he made some of the most difficult and far-reaching of any president. If not brilliant or eloquent, he was courageous and principled. The invisible something he brought to the office was character. — David McCullough

For the last fifty years we've been supporting right-wing governments, and that is a puzzlement to me ... I don't understand what there is in the American character ... that almost automatically, even when we have a liberal President, we support fascist dictatorships or are tolerant towards them. — Michael Parenti

Let me just be candid: My party is full of racists. And the real reason a considerable portion of my party wants President Obama out of the White House has nothing to do with the content of his character, nothing to do with his competence as commander-in-chief and president, and everything to do with the color of his skin. And that's despicable. — Colin Powell

Herbert Hoover was a man of genuine, fine character, but he lacked practical political sense. And he couldn't bend and shift and change with the requirements of the time. And he was a ruined President, because he was such a, I think, stiff-backed ideologue. And I think that speaks volumes about his character. — Robert Dallek

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends - honesty and hard work, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism - these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility - a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task. — Barack Obama

It is Nixon himself who represents that dark, venal and incurably violent side of the American character that almost every country in the world has learned to fear and despise. Our Barbie-doll president, with his Barbie-doll wife and his boxful of Barbie-doll children is also America's answer to the monstrous Mr. Hyde. He speaks for the Werewolf in us; the bully, the predatory shyster who turns into something unspeakable, full of claws and bleeding string-warts on nights when the moon comes too close ... — Hunter S. Thompson

The long-continued and useful public service and eminent purity of character of the deceased ex-President will be remembered. — Ulysses S. Grant

Same first name as a president and an obscure comic book character. Half-Jewish. Excellent grammar. Easily nauseated. Likes Reese's and Oreos (i.e. not an idiot). Divorced parents. Big brother to a fetus. Dad lives in Savannah. Dad's an English teacher. Mom's an epidemiologist.
The problem is, I'm beginning to realize I hardly know anything about anyone. I mean I generally know who's a virgin. But I don't have a clue whether most people's parents are divorced, or what their parents do for a living. I mean, Nick's parents are doctors. But I don't know what Leah's mom does, and I don't even know what the deal is with her dad, because Leah never talks about him. I have no idea why Abby's dad and brother still live in DC. And these are my best friends. I've always thought of myself as nosy, but I guess I'm just nosy about stupid stuff.
It's actually really terrible, now that I think about it. — Becky Albertalli

Our decision about energy will test the character of the American people and the ability of the President and the Congress to govern this Nation. This difficult effort will be the moral equivalent of war, except that we will be uniting our efforts to build and not to destroy. — Jimmy Carter

One of the greatest weaknesses of Chris Mitchell's editorship of the Australian is that he has allowed Greg Sheridan to remain his foreign editor throughout. Sheridan is a man who argued in different columns that George W. Bush was the Winston Churchill of our era; that unlike mediocre politicians like Barack Obama and John McCain, the "new star" of American politics, Sarah Palin, was able to combine "celebrity" with "character"; that President Obama's "anti-Israel hysteria" was leading his administration toward "licensing a mutant strain of anti-semitism"; and that the United States would most likely be strengthened by the crash of Wall Street in September 2008. — Robert Manne

I would trust you with my whole fortune," he told the president. "I would trust you with my life and the welfare of my children. It is inconceivable to me that you would ever trick me or otherwise betray me. My whole world, all my faith in my judgment of human character would collapse. — Mario Puzo

Whether you're president or speaker, if you're wrong, we need to stand up and point it out. That's what Martin Luther King had talked about: being judged by the content of our character and not the color of our skin. So some of us pounded away on some of the ridiculous policies of Pelosi - and lo and behold, over time, the public began to see. — Louie Gohmert

The problem that we have is the President himself- a President who prides himself on his own weakness and incompetence and whose love of false prophets and strange women knows no bounds and has no end. A President who is as confused and as clueless as the comic character called Chancey Gardner in the celebrated 1970's Peter Seller's Hollywood blockbuster titled Being There — Femi Fani-Kayode

Ian was a good man - honest, trustworthy, loyal, and of honorable character. His desire to keep his promise to Angelle and to be a respectable servant of Harrowbeth would always take president over any personal feelings, no matter how intense or gratifying they might be. He would never betray Harrowbeth. He would never cheat Derian or Angelle. He would never deceive his queen, even if in so doing he would find a love and happiness they both longed to share. His commitment to what he saw as right meant more. — Richelle E. Goodrich

What we saw with both Donald Trump and Marco Rubio, that their response, whenever you point to anything in their record, is just to yell, "Liar, liar, liar," and to get very personal and to make direct character attacks. And my approach, from the very beginning of this [President's] campaign, starting a year ago [in 2015], is that I will not respond in kind. I do not intend to insult any of the candidates. — Ted Cruz

The first time I was privileged to meet president Mandela was during his visit to Malawi ... shortly after he was released from prison. I was amazed by his humility and his great sense of leadership ... Mandela's character has shaped my life. — Joyce Banda

If I were to run for president, then people would debate the pros and cons of what's wrong with me in increasingly aggressive 140 character tweets and Facebook status updates, and, inevitably, everyone would end up fighting. — Jen Lancaster

The thing about our cast - and I'm not saying this just to be diplomatic - is that everyone is really fun, and really hardworking, in equal measure. Julia [Louis-Dreyfus] and Tony [Hale, who plays President Meyer's "bag man," Gary Walsh] are always doing outrageous "bits" in character right before we start scenes, which are hilarious. — Sarah Sutherland

It is a little-known but significant fact that no president has appeared more times in Superman comic books than JFK. He was even entrusted with Superman's secret identity and once pretended to be Clark Kent so as to prevent it from being exposed. When Supergirl debuted as a character, she was formally presented to the Kennedys. (Not surprisingly, the president took an immediate liking to her.) In a special issue dedicated to getting American youth to become physically fit - just like the astronaut 'Colonel Glenn' - Kennedy enlists Superman on a mission to close 'the muscle gap'. — Jonah Goldberg

It has been my honor to support and work with President Barack Obama, a man who has brought courage and character to the presidency. President Obama's strength of character leads him to do the right thing, even when it isn't the easy thing. — Harry Reid

By these last-minute improvisations, he had, without calling any undue attention to the fact, become the first president to play the race card both ways - once traditionally and once, so to speak, in reverse. His opportunist defenders, having helped him with a reversible chameleonlike change in the color of his skin, still found themselves stuck with the content of his character. — Christopher Hitchens

The presidency is a serious job that requires sound judgment and good ideas, and there's no doubt in my mind that Jeb Bush has the experience and the character to be a great president. — George W. Bush

In April 2002, I saw the Bush family once again during a JJRTC tour similar to the one we had conducted for the Clintons. It was strange to see George W. Bush grown up and president. It took me back to when I first arrived at the White House - a rookie being cued in by old hats. I hoped President Bush could bring back what was so sorely missed and what once existed under his father. Dynasties made me nervous, but I sorely hoped Bush 43 (our forty-third president) would restore the White House to the level of dignity that Papa Bush had promoted. I thought of my own father, the life I led, and what my son might be like. Was I as strong as my father? Had I kept my promise to protect others? Would my children retain their character? I was honored that the new president remembered me and shook my hand, just as his father would have. I asked about Bush 41 (our forty-first president). It was blast. — Gary J. Byrne

What does it say about a president's policies when he has to use a cartoon character rather than real people to justify his record? What does it say about the fiction of old liberalism to insist that good jobs and good schools and good wages will result from policies that have failed us, time and again? — Mitt Romney

No president in history has been more vilified or was more vilivied during the time he was President than Lincoln. Those who knew him, his secretaries, have written that he was deeply hurt by what was said about him and drawn about him, but on the other hand, Lincoln had the great strength of character never to display it, always able to stand tall and strong and firm no matter how harsh or unfair the criticism might be. These elements of greatness, of course, inspire us all today. — Richard M. Nixon

The campaign of character assassination waged [against President Clinton] by the right was a singular, unprecedented effort. Nothing like it exists on the left. What I object to on the right is the obsessive hatred, the bigotry, and the personal savaging of their opponents, all achieved through an echo chamber of talk radio, the Internet and Rupert Murdoch's media outlets. That kind of well-funded disinformation campaign has no analog on the left. — David Brock

One of the things particularly admirable in the public utterances of President Lincoln is a certain tone of familiar dignity, which, while it is perhaps the most difficult attainment of mere style, is also no doubtful indication of personal character. There must be something essentially noble in an elective ruler who can descend to the level of confidential ease without forfeiting respect, something very manly in one who can break through the etiquette of his conventional rank and trust himself to the reason and intelligence of those who have elected him. — James Russell Lowell

Presidential biography is, by its nature, out of scale; no character is bigger, no action greater, than the person and the doings of the American president. — Jill Lepore

The fighter (like the writer) must stand alone. If he loses he cannot call an executive conference and throw off on a vice president or the assistant sales manager. He is consequently resented by fractional characters who cannot live outside an organization. — A.J. Liebling

Quote from Ranger Captain David Craig, character in Voice in the Wilderness, page 187:
"If the House and the Senate had the guts to stick to it [Constitution], and we could trust SCOTUS to uphold it, we wouldn't be in this mess. — H.L. Wegley

In a president, character is everything. A president doesn't have to be brilliant ... He doesn't have to be clever; you can hire clever ... You can hire pragmatic, and you can buy and bring in policy wonks. But you cant buy courage and decency, you cant rent a strong moral sense. A president must bring those things with him. He needs to have, in that much maligned word, but a good one nonetheless, a vision of the future he wishes to create.. But a vision is worth little if a president doesn't have the character - the courage and heart - to see it through. — Peggy Noonan

I have a new show now called 'The Bridge,' where I play a guy who's a real-life guy. My character's based on the life of a guy named Craig Bromell who was a cop for 12 years and then became head of the police association, so basically the president of the union for 85,000 cops. — Aaron Douglas

Washington's character was rock solid. He came to stand for the new nation and its republican virtues, which was why he became our first President by unanimous choice. — Stephen Ambrose

When a judge walks into the room, and everybody stands up, you're not standing up to that guy, you're standing up to the robe that he's wearing and the role that he's going to play. What makes him worthy of that role is his integrity, as a representative of the principles of that role, and not some group of prejudices of his own. So what you're standing up to is a mythological character. I imagine some kings and queens are the most stupid, absurd, banal people you could run into, probably interested only in horses and women, you know. But you're not responding to them as personalities, you're responding to them in their mythological roles. When someone becomes a judge, or President of the United States, the man is no longer that man, he's the representative of an eternal office; he has to sacrifice his personal desires and even life possibilities to the role that he now signifies. — Joseph Campbell

That this gentleman [President John Adams] ought not to be the object of the federal wish, is, with me, reduced to demonstration. His administration has already very materially disgraced and sunk the government. There are defects in his character which must inevitably continue to do this more and more. And if he is supported by the federal party, his party must in the issue fall with him. — Alexander Hamilton

You've all seen over the last eight years what President Obama means to this country. He is the embodiment of honor, resolve, and character - one of the finest presidents we have ever had. — Joe Biden