If being tolerant of differing opinions, if believing that America has to make it as a pluralistic nation, if being civil, if that makes you a liberal, I plead guilty.
Bill MoyersCharity depends on the vicissitudes of whim and personal wealth; justice depends on commitment instead of circumstance. Faith-based charity provides crumbs from the table; faith-based justice offers a place at the table.
Bill MoyersThe most fundamental liberal failure of the current era: the failure to embrace a moral vision of America based on the transcendent faith that human beings are more than the sum of their material appetites, our country is more than an economic machine, and freedom is not license but responsibility.
Bill MoyersBig money and big business, corporations and commerce, are again the undisputed overlords of politics and government. The White House, the Congress and, increasingly, the judiciary, reflect their interests. We appear to have a government run by remote control from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers and the American Petroleum Institute. To hell with everyone else.
Bill MoyersThe most encouraging sign is that 71 percent of the public believe the system is profoundly corrupted by the power of money. Ninety-six percent of the people believe it's "important" that we reduce the influence of money. Yet 91 percent think it's "not likely" that its influence will be lessened. Think about that: People know what's right to do yet don't think it can or will be done.
Bill MoyersAlthough I was brought up in a culturally and religious conservative culture, as a Baptist I was taught that no one has the right to subpoena your conscience.
Bill MoyersSure enough, as merger has followed merger, journalism has been driven further down the hierarchy of values in the huge conglomerates that dominate what we see, read and hear. And to feed the profit margins journalism has been directed to other priorities than "the news we need to know to keep our freedoms"
Bill MoyersThe printed page conveys information and commitment, and requires active involvement. Television conveys emotion and experience, and it's very limited in what it can do logically. It's an existential experience - there and then gone.
Bill MoyersWhen certain causes become prairie fires, politicians make difficult choices, and often at the expense of someone like Jeremiah Wright and Walter Jenkins. That's the cruel nature of American politics, where the end becomes the consummate objective, and sometimes the means to get there come at a great price.
Bill MoyersWhy is the country not having this conversation, the kind of conversation that requires the politicians who are responsible for the war to be specific to the concerns of the American people.
Bill MoyersPlutocracy too long tolerated leaves democracy on the auction block, subject to the highest bidder.
Bill MoyersYou only have to glance at the daily news to see how passions are stirred by claims of exclusive loyalty to one's own kin, one's own clan, one's own country, and one's own church. These ties that bind are vital to our communities and our lives, but they can also be twisted into a noose.
Bill MoyersIf the watchdog doesn't bark, how do you know there's a burglar in the basement? And the press is supposed to be a watchdog.
Bill MoyersThere is no more important struggle for American democracy than ensuring a diverse, independent and free media. Free Press is at the heart of that struggle.
Bill MoyersAs a student I learned from wonderful teachers and ever since then I've thought everyone is a teacher.
Bill MoyersBarack Obama strikes me as a man of strong principles and weak convictions - the kind of guy who would rather teach constitutional law than practice it, or who'd rather watch the match alone on TV than arm-wrestle his opponents.
Bill MoyersThe rich today are richer, there are more of them, they have round-the-clock propaganda factories in Rupert Murdoch's empire and rightwing talk radio, and corporate media have their back.
Bill MoyersA producer is a saboteur who tries to infiltrate the passivity of viewers and to create impressions that are lasting.
Bill MoyersLyndon Johnson was thirteen of the most interesting and difficult men I ever met. He could be as couth as he was uncouth, as magnanimous as malicious, at times proud and sensitive, at times paranoid and darkly uneasy with himself. Freud would have had a field day with him.
Bill MoyersIn uniform patriotism can salute one flag only, embrace but the first circle of life - one's own land and tribe. In war that is necessary, in peace it is not enough.
Bill MoyersEmpty your knapsack of all adjectives, adverbs and clauses that slo your stride and weaken your pace. Travel light. Remember the most memorable sentences in the English language are also the shortest: "The King is dead" and "Jesus wept."
Bill MoyersThere's hardly a more bitter pill to take than when a President disappoints the people who most believed in him.
Bill MoyersAlthough our interests as citizens vary, each one is an artery to the heart that pumps life through the body politic, and each is important to the health of democracy.
Bill MoyersDemocracy doesn't begin at the top; it begins at the bottom, when flesh-and-blood human beings fight to rekindle what Arlo Guthrie calls 'The Patriot's Dream.
Bill MoyersWhat we need is what the ancient Israelites called hochma - the science of the heart...the capacity to see, to feel, and then to act as if the future depended on you. Believe me, it does.
Bill MoyersI'm angry at what's happening to America and angry with myself that I can't do more. I would be miserable if I couldn't bear witness.
Bill MoyersHow do we protect the soul of democracy against bad theology in service of an imperial state?
Bill MoyersWe don't care really about children as a society and television reflects that indifference to children as human beings.
Bill MoyersFox News and Rush Limbaugh have raised ignorance to ideology and stupefied an entire political party. No more roguish and rowdy band of predators ever did more to demean and despoil the democracy on whose carcass they feed.
Bill MoyersThey're counting on your patriotism to distract you from their plunder. They're counting on you to be standing at attention with your hand over your heart, pledging allegiance to the flag, while they pick your pocket!
Bill MoyersDavid Rockefeller is the most conspicuous representative today of the ruling class, a multinational fraternity of men who shape the global economy and manage the flow of its capital. Rockefeller was born to it, and he has made the most of it. But what some critics see as a vast international conspiracy, he considers a circumstance of life and just another day's work... In the world of David Rockefeller it's hard to tell where business ends and politics begins
Bill MoyersIf you think there is freedom of the press in the United States, I tell you there is no freedom of the press... They come out with the cheap shot. The press should be ashamed of itself. They should come to both sides of the issue and hear both sides and let the American people make up their minds
Bill MoyersWhen the public loses faith in democracy's ability to solve the problems it has created for itself, the game's almost over. And I think we are this close to losing democracy to the mercenary class.
Bill Moyers