William J. Clinton Quotes

No one who has lived through the second half of the 20th century could possibly be blind to the enormous impact of exchange programs on the future of countries.

When I was a younger man and had a life, I owned an El Camino pickup in the '70s. It was a real sort of Southern deal. I had Astroturf in the back.

Let me be clear: we are still a nation of immigrants, and we honor all those immigrants who are working hard to become new citizens.

I never thought of political endeavors primarily in terms of power and prestige, and I never thought of economic endeavors primarily in terms of wealth and position.

The problem with any ideology is that it gives you the answer before you examine the evidence.

I believe we can do much more to adapt to the structural changes in the global economy, get high-end manufacturing back here, set up clusters of economic activity where you have, among other things, continuous retraining of people well into their middle years so they never become irrelevant to the current job market.

Communications and commerce are global; investment is mobile; technology is almost magical; and ambition for a better life is now universal. We earn our livelihood in peaceful competition with people all across the earth. Profound and powerful forces are shaking and remaking our world, and the urgent question of our time is whether we can make change our friend and not our enemy.

The most profound security threat we face today is global warming....climate change has the capacity to change the way all of us live.

What we believe in is what works.

India.. a perfectly wonderful country, may have been motivated by a lack of self-esteem.

If you believe in a security strategy - a strategy of more friends and fewer enemies, a strategy of greater cooperation and a strategy of keeping America better at home as we grow more diverse - we have to build the minds and hearts to build this kind of world.

I do not believe we can repair the basic fabric of society until people who are willing to work have work. Work organizes life. It gives structure and discipline to life.

I think that most small amounts of marijuana have been decriminalized in some places, and should be. We really need a re-examination of our entire policy on imprisonment...Our imprisonment policies are counterproductive.

We must teach our children to resolve their conflicts with words, not weapons.

The established order has too many self-protecting economic entities, and not enough people who yet understand what it takes to change.

Today's possibilities are not tomorrows guarantees.

I want the ability to monitor high-tech communications among far-flung terrorists. I want to be able to have our people learn their plans before they strike. That's the key.

It depends upon what the meaning of the word 'is' is. If 'is' means 'is and never has been' that's one thing - if it means 'there is none', that was a completely true statement.

Rigorously investigated and fearlessly reported, A Crime So Monstrous is a passionate and thorough examination of the appalling reality of human bondage in today's world. In his devastating narrative, Ben Skinner boldly casts light on the unthinkable, yet thriving, modern-day practice of slavery, exposing a global trade in human lives. The abuses detailed in these pages are repugnant, but there is hope to be found: by giving voice to the victims, Skinner helps restore their dignity and makes crucial strides toward closing this shameful chapter in history.

The purpose of government is to rein in the rights of the people.

When you get asked hundreds of questions, it's not possible to remember the answer to every one.

My father left me with the feeling that I had to live for two people, and that if I did it well enough, somehow I could make up for the life he should have had. And his memory infused me, at a younger age than most, with a sense of my own mortality. The knowledge that I, too, could die young drove me both to try to drain the most out of every moment of life and to get on with the next big challenge. Even when I wasn't sure where I was going, I was always in a hurry.

I like the vegetables, the fruits, the beans, the stuff I eat now...All my blood tests are good, and my vital signs are good, and I feel good, and I also have, believe it or not, more energy.

President Obama's record on national security is a tribute to his strength, and judgment, and to his preference for inclusion and partnership over partisanship.

The great thing about this game is that the bad days are wonderful.

There is a huge body of business evidence now showing that energy savings give better service at lower cost with higher profit. We have to tear down barriers to successful markets and we have to create incentives to enter them.

Nearly every problem has been solved by someone, somewhere. The challenge of the 21st century is to find out what works and scale it up.

Part of our essential humanity is paying respect to what God gave us and what will be here a long time after we're gone.

Posterity is the world to come; the world for whom we hold our ideals, from whom we have borrowed our planet, and to whom we bear sacred responsibility. We must do what America does best: offer more opportunity to all and demand responsibility from all.

I don't know in my long life that I ever worked with anybody that has quite the combination of policy knowledge and concern, political skills, of a personal touch with people, and a sense of innate fairness that inspires confidence.

When I think about the world I would like to leave to my daughter and the grandchildren I hope to have, it is a world that moves away from unequal, unstable, unsustainable interdependence to integrated communities - locally, nationally and globally - that share the characteristics of all successful communities.

It simply doesn't make any sense for us to have illegal aliens in our custody in our courts and then let them go back to living here illegally. That's wrong and we should stop it.

I like the job. That's what I'll miss the most... I'm not sure anybody ever liked this as much as I've liked it.

The new century demands new partnerships for peace and security. The United Nations plays a crucial role, with allies sharing burdens America might otherwise bear alone. America needs a strong and effective U.N. I want to work with this new Congress to pay our dues and our debts. We must continue to support security and stability in Europe and Asia - expanding NATO and defining its new missions, maintaining our alliance with Japan, with Korea, with our other Asian allies, and engaging China.

Today, many companies are reporting that their number one constraint on growth is the inability to hire workers with the necessary skills.

Abortion should not only be safe and legal, it should be rare.

For too long we've been told about 'us' and 'them.' Each and every election we see a new slate of arguments and ads telling us that 'they' are the problem, not 'us.' But there can be no 'them' in America. There's only us.

A lot of presidential memoirs, they say, are dull and self-serving. I hope mine is interesting and self-serving.

[Alternative energy] will make us less dependent on foreign oil. It would make us more secure in our future. It would mean that our foreign policy could be a reflection of our values and our other interests, and not just that.

People will vote for someone who [they perceive] is strong and wrong before they will vote for someone who appears weak but is right.

You know, there was a recent poll which said that young people in the generation of the students here felt it was far more likely that they would see a UFO than that they would draw Social Security... It's very important you understand this. Once you understand this, you realize this is not an episode from the X Files, and you're not more likely to see a UFO if you do certain specific things.

What we should be doing [in US] is accelerating every year our efforts to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, have a cleaner energy future, have much more energy conservation. And this won't hurt anybody. This will create a new economy for America, if we've got the discipline to do it.

Sure enough at Oxford, I was another Yank half a step behind.

The world economy, the world environment, the world AIDS crisis, the world arms race: they affect us all.

I have always believed that the decision to have an abortion generally should be between a woman, her doctor, her conscience, and her God.

We will lower the tax burden on middle class Americans by asking the very wealthy to pay their fair share. Middle class taxpayers will have a choice between a children's tax credit or a significant reduction in their income tax rate.

Never tell anyone to go to hell unless you can make 'em go.

I had some words with my wife, and she had some paragraphs with me.