Shape America Quotes & Sayings

Even more complex and dangerous than the river itself were the fishes, mammals, and reptiles that inhabited it. Like the rain forest that surrounds and depends upon it, the Amazon river system is a prodigy of speciation and diversity, serving as home to more than three thousand species of freshwater fishes - more than any other river system on earth. Its waters are crowded with creatures of nearly every size, shape, and evolutionary adaptation, from tiny neon tetras to thousand-pound manatees to pink freshwater boto dolphins to stingrays to armor-plated catfishes to bullsharks. By comparison, the entire Missouri and Mississippi river system that drains much of North America has only about 375 fish — Candice Millard

My telephone calls and meetings and decisions were now parts of a prescribed ritual aimed at making peace with the past; his calls, his meetings and his decisions were already the ones that would shape America's future. (On transfer of power to Gerald R Ford) — Richard M. Nixon

The subsequent course of events there (in the Republic of Georgia) confirmed the truth that if America or the West as a whole fails to shape the aftermath of wars in areas of vital interests, unfriendly powers will do so, and with dangerous consequences for the West. Among the likely consequences of Russia's successful aggression in this instance are the likely permanent truncation of Georgia, its long-term exclusion from NATO, further division within NATO, and the emboldening of Russia to take further military actions in neighboring countries when it considered it necessary to do so. — Svante E. Cornell

I'll know America is in bad shape when Cubans in Miami get in the water and swim back to Cuba. — Carlos Mencia

The sad truth is that, within the public sphere, within the collective consciousness of the general populace, most of the history of Indians in North America has been forgotten, and what we are left with is a series of historical artifacts and, more importantly, a series of entertainments. As a series of artifacts, Native history is somewhat akin to a fossil hunt in which we find a skull in Almo, Idaho, a thigh bone on the Montana plains, a tooth near the site of Powhatan's village in Virginia, and then, assuming that all the parts are from the same animal, we guess at the size and shape of the beast. As a series of entertainments, Native history is an imaginative cobbling together of fears and loathings, romances and reverences, facts and fantasies into a cycle of creative performances, in Technicolor and 3-D, with accompanying soft drinks, candy, and popcorn.
In the end, who really needs the whole of Native history when we can watch the movie? — Thomas King

We have left behind the rosy agrarian rhetoric and slaveholding reality of Jeffersonian democracy and reside in the bustling world of trade, industry, stock markets, and banks that Hamilton envisioned. (Hamilton's staunch abolitionism formed an integral feature of this economic vision.) He has also emerged as the uncontested visionary in anticipating the shape and powers of the federal government. At a time when Jefferson and Madison celebrated legislative power as the purest expression of the popular will, Hamilton argued for a dynamic executive branch and an independent judiciary, along with a professional military, a central bank, and an advanced financial system. Today, we are indisputably the heirs to Hamilton's America, and to repudiate his legacy is, in many ways, to repudiate the modern world. — Ron Chernow

That is America. That is America. Those bonds of affection; that common creed. We don't fear the future; we shape it. We embrace it, as one people, stronger together than we are on our own. — Barack Obama

Guilt is the most destructive of all emotions. It mourns what has been while playing no part in what may be, now or in the future. — Penelope Leach

Generally students are the best vehicles for passing on ideas, for their thoughts are plastic and can be molded and they can adjust the ideas of old men to the shape of reality as they find it in villages and hills of China or in ghettos and suburbs of America. — Theodore White

Fashion is not public opinion, or the result of embodiment of public opinion. It may be that public opinion will condemn the shape of a bonnet, as it may venture to do always, and with the certainty of being right nine times in ten: but fashion will place it upon the head of every woman in America; and, were it literally a crown of thorns, she would smile contentedly beneath the imposition. — J.G. Holland

In my view, the greatest threat to America's future isn't hiding in a cave in Pakistan or Afghanistan; it's right here at home. Baby boomers like myself are on course to become the first generation of Americans who leave things in worse shape than they found them. — David Walker

The mainstream media in America has become an insidious device of ignorance.
They not only shape the story, but now participate. For what? — Jonathan Heatt

We were a Western civilisation, an English speaking civilisation, both NZ and Australia, and we had all these influences coming from both Great Britain and America to us; sending us their culture in the shape and form of movies and television. — Richard O'Brien

The brank, or scold's bridle, was unknown in America in its English shape: though from colonial records we learn that scolding women were far too plentiful, and were gagged for that annoying and irritating habit. — Alice Morse Earle

We want the children to conform; we want to control their minds, to shape their conduct, their way of living, so that they will fit into the pattern of society, That is what every parent wants, is it not? And that is exactly what is happening, whether it be in America or in Europe, in Russia or in India. The pattern may vary slightly, but they all want the child to conform. — Jiddu Krishnamurti

There was his father, looking totally different but exactly the same.
"Hey, son," his dad said, his voice bending in that weird way that America had started to shape it. — Patrick Ness

The whole life of man until he is converted to Christ is a ruinous labyrinth of wanderings. — John Calvin

I really believe that when we start talking ourselves back, we'll have more to offer the world." he [Woodenkinfe] said. "I don't want a gray world."
"You mean taking back our cultures and where we come from."
"Absolutely! You want to talk about the fabric of this country, that's it."
"So rather than a melting pot, it would be a ... "
"A blanket of color, all sewn in the shape of the U.S. — Philip Caputo

Man lives in a double world: according to the mind he is contained by no physical space and by no walls, but at the same time he is in heaven and on earth, in Italy, in France, in America, wherever the mind's thrust penetrates and extends by understanding, seeking, mastering. But indeed according to the body he exists not, except in only so much space as is least required, held fast in prison and in chains to the extent that he is not able to be in or to go to the place attained by his intellect and will, nor to occupy more space than defined by the shape of his body; while with the mind he occupies a thousand worlds. — Tommaso Campanella

The person who takes the oath of office in the next four months will shape not just the next four years, but the next forty years of our nation. In these next four years, we need proven leadership, proven judgment and proven values. America needs four more years of President Barack Obama. — Rahm Emanuel

I'm glad some people have that faith. I don't have that faith. If there is a God, a caring God, then we have to figure he's done an extraordinary job of making a very cruel world. — Dave Matthews

It had grown cold in the night but he was numb with other weathers. An equinox in the heart, ill change, unluck. Suttree held his face in his hands. Child of darkness and familiar of small dooms. He himself used to wake in terror to find whole congregations of the uninvited attending his bed, protean figures slouched among the room's dark corners in all multiplicity of shapes, gibbons and gargoyles, arachnoids of outrageous size, a batshaped creature hung by some cunning in a high corner from whence clicked and winked like bone chimes its incandescent teeth. — Cormac McCarthy

I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the city of Savannah. — William Tecumseh Sherman

We are all familiar with intellectuals who speak only on behalf of their country, class, religion, 'race,' 'gender,' or 'sexual orientation,' and who shape their opinions according to what they take to be the interest of their affinity of birth or predilection. But the distinctive feature of the liberal intellectual in past times was precisely the striving for universality; not the unworldly or disingenuous denial of sectional identification but the sustained effort to transcend that identification in search of truth or the general interest ... In today's America, neoconservatives generate brutish policies for which liberals provide the ethical fig leaf. There really is no other diifference between them. — Tony Judt

Globalization makes our economy, our health, and our security all captive to events on the other side of the world. And no other nation on earth has a greater capacity to shape that global system, or to build consensus around a new set of international rules that expand the zones of freedom, personal safety, and economic well-being. Like it or not, if we want to make America more secure, we are going to have to help make the world more secure. — Barack Obama

Slave autonomy and resistance altered the shape and course of slaveholding in America. For all the masters who took up the lash to suppress the bondsman's "insolence," there were others who were compelled to recognize the dignity of their slaves as workers. Still others came to a standoff. One traveler found the slaveholders so afraid of their bondsmen that they were prevented from inflicting punishment "lest the slave should abscond, or take a sulky fit and not work, or poison some of the family, or set fire to the dwelling, or have recourse to any other mode of avenging himself. — James Oakes

Aging is not just decay, you know. It's growth. It's more than the negative that you're going to die, it's also the positive, that you understand going to die, and you live a better life because of it. — Mitch Albom

Who am I? Flying, I live,
and sometimes I make songs:
flower songs, butterflies of songs -
such as reveal my sentiments,
such as express my heart.

I arrive at the side of others. I descend
and alight on earth, the red macaw of spring.
I stretch my wings beside the flower drums,
my song lifts and spreads over the earth. — Peter Everwine

It is Israel that must recognize Palestine's rights. We cannot believe in empty statements, twiddle our thumbs and watch our children getting killed. Israel must end occupation and aggression, and our actions won't take much longer after that. — Khaled Mashal

Apocalyptic saucer cults have started to spring up all over America. One small group, which has been receiving messages from outer space via Lake City housewife Mrs. Marian Keech, becomes the subject of a research team led by psychologist Leon Festinger. According to an alien entity named Sananda, the end of the world is due any day and under the most cataclysmic of circumstances. The group meets regularly to discuss the latest predictions from Sananda and the rest of the Space Brothers, all relayed to them by Mrs. Keech. Some members bake cakes in the shape of flying saucers to be consumed during their gatherings while local college football scores are closely debated. — Ken Hollings

Black History is enjoying the life of our ancestors who paved the way for every African-American. No matter what color you are, the history of Blacks affected everyone; that's why we should cherish and respect Black history. Black history changed America and is continuing to change and shape our country. Black history is about everyone coming together to better themselves and America. Black history is being comfortable in your own skin no matter what color you are. Black history makes me proud of where I came from and where I am going in life. — Bernice Mosby

I ... now see a rare opportunity to push across the goal line much of the unfinished business of America: investing in our infrastructure and workers, universal healthcare, comprehensive immigration reform and scrubbing a tax code that's out of shape and behind the times. — Xavier Becerra

Unlike my father and millions of Chinese, everyone in America - every man, woman and child, whether rich or poor - has the freedom to choose, freedom to shape his or her own destiny. Don't you agree that you can better manage your own life than other people can? — Helen Raleigh

I thought you didn't like animals."
"I love animals. Where did you get that idea?" Marmie put her paws on his leg, and he picked her up.
"From my dog?"
"That's a dog? Jeez, I'm sorry. I thought it was an industrial-waste accident." His long, lean fingers slid through the cat's fur.
"Slytherin." She slapped the lid back onto the flour container. What kind of man liked a cat more than he liked an exceptionally fine French poodle?
"What did you call me?"
"It's a literary reference. You wouldn't understand."
"Harry Potter. And I don't appreciate name calling. — Susan Elizabeth Phillips

The government regulates them, or chooses not to, approves or blocks their mergers and acquisitions, and sets their tax policies (often turning a blind eye to the billions parked in offshore tax havens). This is why tech companies, like the rest of corporate America, inundate Washington with lobbyists and quietly pour hundreds of millions of dollars in contributions into the political system. Now they're gaining the wherewithal to fine-tune our political behavior - and with it the shape of American government - just by tweaking their algorithms. — Cathy O'Neil

There's a lot more to playing in the big leagues in New York than just the baseball part. — David Wright

At the final judgment, everyone will stand before God alone. — R.C. Sproul

Because we grew up surrounded by big dramatic story arcs in books and movies, we think our lives are supposed to be filled with huge ups and downs. So people pretend there is drama where there is none. — Kurt Vonnegut

This, then, is the legacy of January 1973. The "me generation" found its voice, religion became a political force, poverty and civil rights became someone else's problem, and the national will for concerted action for the common good of all its citizens was scattered into "a thousand points of light."

At some point, perhaps those scattered lights will re-form and reunite to give birth to a rededicated nation, one that includes a place for everyone, opportunity for all, and help for those who need it. After all, it only takes a moment in time and some simultaneity. As Lyndon Johnson so aptly observed in his greatest speech - the "We Shall Overcome" speech - there are times in America when "history and fate meet at a single time in a single space to shape a turning point in man's unending search for freedom."

Let us hop such a time is nearing. — James Robenalt

After two undefeated seasons of 'Worst Cooks in America,' I'm ready for a third. Going against Bobby Flay takes the challenge to another level, but I'm ready to whip these contestants into shape and the winner is sure to be from Team Burrell. — Anne Burrell

Oh Mom, it turns out my knight in shining armor was just some liar in tinfoil. — Taryn Plendl