Texas Politics Quotes & Sayings

BECAUSE THIS MONEY came from Texas, the rise of Lyndon Johnson sheds light on the new economic forces that surged out of the Southwest in the middle of the twentieth century, on the immense influence exerted over America's politics, its governmental institutions, its foreign and domestic policies by these forces: the oil and sulphur and gas and defense barons of the Southwest. As the robber barons of the last century looted the nation's earth of its wealth - its coal and coke, its oil and ore, its iron, its forests, the very surface of its earth to provide a footing for the rails of their railroads - and used part of that wealth to ensure that the nation's government would not force them to give more than a pittance of their loot back to the nation's people, so the robber barons of this century have drained the earth of the Southwest of its riches and have used those riches to bend government to their ends. — Robert A. Caro

After all, Ginger Rogers did everything that Fred Astaire did. She just did it backwards and in high heels. — Ann Richards

The high point was that the people are really nice - despite the crazy politics - and I loved being there. The hardest part was knowing some of the things I was probably going to write about Texas would make those nice people very unhappy. — Gail Collins

Texas has a lot of electrical votes. [During an election campaign, after George Bush stated that Texas was important to the election] — Yogi Berra

The evil that is in the world always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding. On the whole, men are more good than bad; that, however, isn't the real point. But they are more or less ignorant, and it is this that we call vice or virtue; the most incorrigible vice being that of an ignorance that fancies it knows everything and therefore claims for itself the right to kill. The soul of the murderer is blind; and there can be no true goodness nor true love without the utmost clearsightedness. Hence — Albert Camus

When people get drunk they do things they shouldn't do. — Johnny Hunt

I'm often asked why I left politics and went to Halliburton and I explain that I reached the point where I was mean-spirited, short-tempered and intolerant of those who disagreed with me and they said 'Hell, you'd make a great CEO', so I went to Texas and joined the private sector. — Dick Cheney

After that cancellation [of the Superconducting Super Collider in Texas, after $2 billion had been spent on it], we physicists learned that we have to sing for our supper ... The Cold War is over. You can't simply say "Russia!" to Congress, and they whip out their checkbook and say, "How much?" We have to tell the people why this atom-smasher is going to benefit their lives. — Michio Kaku

Next time I tell you someone from Texas should not be president of the United States, please pay attention.
[Shrub Flubs His Dub, The Nation, June 18, 2001] — Molly Ivins

I think Karl Rove saw that in George W. Bush early on and understood the impact that he could have on Texas politics and probably on national politics. — Ed Gillespie

I don't need art to tell me people are assholes. I can just go into the streets. — Etgar Keret

I never saw anything funnier than Texas politics. — Molly Ivins

The American craving for illegal, mind-altering, addictive chemicals provides a steady flow of American capital through the Texas border into Mexico and South America. Basically, the drug traffic is uncontainable as long as its U.S. market exists, but newspapers and other media virtuously trumpet feel-good headlines about "record drug busts" and arrests while the drug trade continues unabated. — William Earl Maxwell

Mental clarity is the child of courage, not the other way around. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Should any political party attempt to abolish social security unemployment insurance and eliminate labor laws and farm programs you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group of course that believes you can do these things. Among them are a few other Texas oil millionaires and an occasional politician or business man from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid. — Dwight D. Eisenhower

Good thing we've still got politics in Texas - finest form of free entertainment ever invented. — Molly Ivins

In my case, I was covering politics in Texas as a newspaper man in the 1960's. — Jim Lehrer

I've always thought hard-boiled detective novels an American art form. At their best, they're more than who-dun-its or thrillers, they're vehicles for a writer's observations about culture, politics, philosophy, music, history and a time or a place. Or life, it's ownself. When you read James Ellroy, Dashiell Hammett or James Lee Burke, their stories are always about far more than good guys chasing bad guys. That's the kind of book I wanted to write. Still do. — Jim Nesbitt

The French have a new president, the British will soon have a new P.M., and we envy them as we endure the endless wait for this small dim man to go back to Texas and resume his life. — Garrison Keillor

In a state that continued to be saddled with a sternly limited governmental structure devised when the South was just emerging from the bruising experience of the Civil War and Reconstruction, she also had to contend with fact that national politics and changing demographics had left her swimming for her life as a liberal Democrat in an ocean of conservative Republicans. In a failed presidential campaign, Texas's Republican senator Phil Gramm once boasted that the best thing a politician can have is money. It helps, of course, and yet he was proved quite wrong: the biggest advantage a politician can have is that people like you. — Jan Reid

By the age of twenty-five, [Louis T. Wigfall] had managed to squander his considerable inheritance, settle three affairs of honor on the dueling ground, fight in a ruthless military campaign against the Seminoles, consume a small lakeful of bourbon, win an enviable reputation in whorehouses throughout the South, and get hauled before a judge on charges of murder. Three years after that, he took the next logical step and went into Texas politics. — Adam Goodheart

As they say around the Texas Legislature, if you can't drink their whiskey, screw their women, take their money, and vote against 'em anyway, you don't belong in office. — Molly Ivins

I don't see how the people who created the problem can fix it. Texas is worth fighting for, and the best way to fight is to get the politicians out of politics. — Kinky Friedman

On Sunday, evening, May 2, 2015, in Garland, Texas, an active-shooter incident didn't end in a massacre. It ended when an armed police officer took the fight to the enemy, literally pushing toward them and killing the duo before they could massacre innocents in a crowded event center. Forget politics. Forget before and after. When the attack is initiated there is no negotiation, no thinking - only fighting, pushing, and close killing. The event in Garland wasn't quite the soft target the terrorists thought it would be. They didn't have the access to the defenseless civilians they thought they'd have. Defend yourself - now rather than later. Strength stops strength. Overwhelming strength stops massacres in their tracks. — Gary J. Byrne

Our communities face many challenges, from keeping our kids safe in public, to the war on terrorism. But few have such immediate consequences as we face from methamphetamine. — Mark Kennedy

I also told them of the manner in which I had been knocked down and dragged out, and that I didn't consider it a fair fight any how they could fix it. I put the ingredients in the cup pretty strong I tell you, and I concluded my speech by telling them that I was done with politics for the present, and they might all go to hell, and I would go to Texas. — Davy Crockett

And the whole Bush family, from Texas, should be boiled in poisoned oil. — Hunter S. Thompson