Eliot Spitzer Quotes

I don't care about motivation. I care about credibility.

Power must be used, but it must be tempered by soul-searching and the recognition of our human capacity for error. That is the maxim that should inform our approach to every challenge, from reforming state government to engaging in foreign affairs.

I stand before you today because this vision of government as the engine of opportunity is what I believe in.

Shareholders have the right and obligation to set the parameters of corporate behavior within which management pursues profit.

Mitt Romney's primary season embrace of the social and economic agenda of the more rabid elements of his party doomed him, especially the shrill immigration rhetoric and the harshly insensitive theory that no additional sacrifice or contribution should be sought from those at the top.

Some say that I should settle down, go slower and not push so hard, so quickly for such transformational change. To them, I say that you misunderstand the size of the problems we face, the strength of the status quo and the urgency of the people's desire for change.

I would very honestly just tell you that what I tried to do was simply respond to inquiries from people as they came in. Where I've thought I could say something useful, I've tried to add a voice that was, frankly, a dissident voice earlier on, but one that I think has become a more mainstream voice-and not because I've shifted. I think that the critique I had of what was going on in our financial system from six, eight years ago-after seeing some of what we've suffered through and even since the cataclysm itself-in terms of the structural changes.

The reason to drive this point home with a vivid and frank comparison is many New Yorkers are still not confronting the reality of how serious our crisis is. It was an exhortation to face reality.

Why does it have to be politics? Is there a dynamism to that world and a theoretical capacity to do things that draws many talented people? Absolutely. Are there other ways to be involved and lead an interesting life? Of course.

In 2007, when I was governor of New York, I proposed that our state once again permit undocumented immigrants to obtain a driver's license. To say the proposal lit a firestorm in the political arena is an understatement.

I do not believe that politics in the long run is about individuals. It is about ideas.

Yes, people pull the trigger - but guns are the instrument of death. Gun control is necessary, and delay means more death and horror.

As someone with a deep faith in competition and the market, I also know that markets only work with tough enforcement of the rules that guarantee competition and fair play - and that the pressure to break those rules only gets stronger as the amount of money involved gets larger.

A year is an eternity in politics - though less than a moment in history.

Global warming threatens our health, our economy, our natural resources, and our children's future. It is clear we must act.