Quotes About Americans

We are Americans first, Americans last, Americans always... Let us argue our differences. But remember we are not enemies, but comrades in a war against a real enemy...

I believe our nation is at a point where there are enough irreconcilable differences between those Americans who want to control other Americans and those Americans who want to be left alone that separation is the only peaceable alternative. Just as in a marriage where vows are broken, our rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution have been grossly violated by a government instituted to protect them. These constitutional violations have increased independent of whether there's been a Democrat-controlled Washington or a Republican-controlled Washington.

America is a country of comparatively recent immigrants, so I'm part of a line there and the old Americans were thrown off their land by the new Americans, and now the new Americans are being thrown off their land by the corporations.

40, 50 years ago, Americans - the majority of Americans did not want to accept these Vietnamese refugees who they saw as completely foreign. Now there are new foreigners - Syrians and other people from the Middle East, people of Muslim backgrounds. And the sense among many Americans is, well, these people are completely different from us, and they're not like the Vietnamese who are much more assimilable. And I think that's very, very doubtful. I think that the majority of these new foreigners, if given the opportunity, will be able to assimilate and deal with American culture.

I do think we have a food problem. In 2006, which is the year for which we have the latest data, 35.5 million Americans were food insecure. That means there are 35.5 million Americans who are so hard up at some point during the year that they didn't know where their next meal was coming from. That's a lot of Americans. They don't get reported very much because there's nothing spectacular about people skipping a meal because they're poor. The media tends to ignore that, just as it ignores the sort of chronic food shortages elsewhere in the world.

People take pride in being Irish-American and Italian-American. They have a particular culture that infuses the whole culture and makes it richer and more interesting. I think if we can expand that attitude to embrace African-Americans and Latino-Americans and Asian-Americans, then we will be in a position where all our kids can feel comfortable with the worlds they are coming out of, knowing they are part of something larger.

The gap between ideals and actualities, between dreams and achievements, the gap that can spur strong men to increased exertions, but can break the spirit of others -- this gap is the most conspicuous, continuous land mark in American history. It is conspicuous and continuous not because Americans achieve little, but because they dream grandly. The gap is a standing reproach to Americans; but it marks them off as a special and singularly admirable community among the world's peoples.

We like to say medicare is uniquely Canadian, but Americans have Medicare too. Even the name. I can't actually determine where the name started, except that it appeared in the two countries at about the same time. Had the Vietnam War not occurred, the Americans would have had a Medicare system much like ours.

Because Social Security has not contributed to our debt, Americans should be skeptical of any politician who says that benefits Americans have earned must be reduced in order to address our national debt.

I think there's sometimes too much attention to a few people who do hold extreme views. Most Americans go about their lives living in communities that are increasingly multiethnic, increasingly multi-religious. And they are welcoming of people who are not like themselves. Now, I don't have rose-colored glasses about America, because I grew up in the segregated South. But I watch it every day. I think that Americans are very tolerant people.

Right now you're seeing more and more families reporting that they are skipping meals. They're having to give up meat. Mothers are foregoing food so their kids can have something. People are growing their own vegetables, not because they've gone organic, but because it's one of the few assured sources of food they have. For low-income Americans food is costly right now. The price of food has been going up, and wages haven't. This puts working Americans in a real bind. The fact that the mainstream media hasn't reported it doesn't mean that it's not happening.

In December, I agreed to extend the tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans because it was the only way I could prevent a tax hike on middle-class Americans. But we cannot afford $1 trillion worth of tax cuts for every millionaire and billionaire in our society. We can't afford it. And I refuse to renew them again.

The influence I would hope to have is to create an environment where we're not singling Americans out - that we are creating opportunities for all Americans. Not saying, 'I'm going to funnel money into your city so that you're completely dependent on government.

[Hillary] Clinton was able to assemble a winning Democratic coalition out here, beating Sanders among African-Americans, women, among women, and voters from union households, so, unions, women, African-Americans.

I'm really tired of Americans being the only ones asked to do all the heavy lifting when it comes to charity, and, quite frankly, my number one concern right now is taking care of the fact that Americans are taking it in the gut without jobs. Many of them working two and three part time jobs. And, if America wants to do something great, let's get our economy growing again, stabilize the dollar, and we'll be in a much better position to help people around the world.

New York has become an example of everything that is wrong with America. White Americans, fearing the crime and social alienation in New York City, commute endless hours to raise their families in safe, clean neighborhoods. The numbers of non-Americans, especially those from the Third World, are growing, and it is the hard working White New Yorker that pays the bill.

To Americans, Washington is a giant cesspool. It's no wonder almost half of Americans (47%) now agree with the statement 'I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore.' It's us (the people) versus them (the politicians), and it doesn't matter what primary color you wear [...] I was involved in the 1994 elections, and I will never forget the arrogance of the Democrats back then, and how they refused to accept the electoral reality facing them. It is no different today.

It may be changing, but still it's the one place, that total control of an institution, that African Americans have. So sometimes, you know, you'll hear the statement of African Americans saying, "I have to work with whites.

We deserve a president of the United States who will write laws for all Americans, not for campaign contributors. And I intend to be a president for all Americans who takes back the flag of our country because it doesn't belong to any party, doesn't belong to any president.

Government isn't a good way to solve problems ... [G]overnment is concerned mostly with self-perpetuation and is subject to fantastic ideas about its own capabilities. ... [G]overnment is wasteful of the nation's resources, immune to common sense and subject to pressure from every half-organized bouquet of assholes. ... [G]overnment is distrustful of and disrespectful toward average Americans while being easily gulled by Americans with money, influence or fame.

In the decade of the 1980s, a massive and comprehensive study of religion in American life was undertaken by the Gallup organization. The results of the study were as terrifying as they were revealing. Americans, even evangelical Americans, are woefully ignorant of the content of Scripture and even more ignorant of the history of Christianity and classical Christian theology.

Senator Obama's support among hardworking Americans - white Americans - is weakening.

All the Americans in the study were native born, but the height of the mother does affect the growth potential of the child. So, there is a second generation effect. But this can explain only a small portion of the height difference between Americans and northern Europeans. Regarless of continent of origin, children who grow up under conditions of good health and nutrition are about the same height, on average.

I think there are profound differences between the civil rights struggle for African Americans and the civil rights struggle for gay Americans.

Most African Americans, especially the men and women from my generation, would accept the nationalist gambit that says only European Americans can be racists, which is an interesting gambit.

Most middle-class Americans, even working-class Americans, encounter each other across racial lines all the time, but it gets really hard-core when you get into that witches' brew that is the combination of race and poverty.

I think there`s so much of us broken for Americans and particularly African-Americans. I think it`s impossible to separate fully some 50-plus allegations of sexual misconduct or sexual assault from Bill Cosby is as a philanthropist or an actor.

Phil Cousineau has created a fine companion book to accompany the important film he and Gary Rhine have made in defense of the religious traditions of Native Americans. [Native Americans] are recognized the world over as keepers of a vital piece of the Creator's original orders, and yet they are regarded as little more than squatters at home. This book features impressive interviews, beautiful illustrations, and gives a voice to the voiceless.

Americans are fickle. And what constitutes the enemy is always changing. Believe it or not, at one time Blacks were the favored model minority over Asian Americans.

Manufacturers employ more than 14 million Americans doing what Americans do best, making things, building things, transforming raw materials into finished products.

There's a culture war in this country. Americans in recent years, as you know, have become more secular. They don't go to church as often. Bible reading, prayers in public are now frowned upon. And, of course, in addition to that, a lot of people have become much more supportive of LGBT rights. And in reaction to that, biblically conservative Americans feel that their faith is under assault.

I believe that America has the opportunity to once again live by our values, live up to our values in the 21st century, but I think that America can only do that if Americans can succeed. And there are lots of reasons why Americans today are feeling left out and left behind.

I also think that we [Americans] are operating out of fear in our country. It's not that terrorism is not a threat, but it's not an existential threat. It is not the preeminent threat facing most Americans on any given day, and yet the power of nightmares is so strong.

But still, I’d be darned if I was going to be one of those Americans who stomp around Italy barking commands in ever-louder English. I was going to be one of those Americans who traversed Italy with my forehead knit in concentration, divining wordsw from their Latin roots and answering by wedging French cognates into Italian pronunciations spliced onto a standard Spanish verb conjugation.

it is only on posters and in advertisement pages that Americans have those chubby cheeks, expanding smiles, smooth looks, and faces flushed with well-being. In fact, almost all are at odds with themselves; drink offers a remedy for this inner malady of which boredom is the most usual sign: as drinking is accepted by society, it does not appear as a sign of their [Americans'] inability to adapt themselves; it is rather the adapted form of inadaptability.

I begin to feel like I was in the last generation of Americans who took a civics class. I begin to feel like most Americans don't understand the First Amendment, don't understand the idea of freedom of speech, and don't understand that it's the responsibility of the citizen to speak out.

But of course, now we're told we're in recovery but this sure doesn't feel like a recovery to more than 9 percent of the Americans out there who are unemployed, or the 16 percent of the African-Americans, 11 percent of Hispanics in the same position, or the millions who can only find part-time work or those who have even stopped looking for a job.

New immigration plan is about legal education. It allows educated people who want to become Americans to stay and become Americans. It was nothing but common sense. It went over the heads of the media because their prejudicial bias did not permit them to even understand this was about legal immigration.

Now that we are rid of this syndrome of imposing the communist model on people, now that we've given them the chance to get rid of this dogma, I have to tell you Americans that you've been pushing your American way of life for decades. You thought it was perfection itself, the ultimate achievement of human thought... There has to be a different approach... Americans have to be more modest in their desires. We have to stimulate human qualities in people rather than greed.

If we are to garner sustained U.S. domestic support for future trade agreements, we have to make sure those Americans who have suffered as a consequence of past agreements have an effective social safety net, adjustment assistance, opportunities for retraining and new job creation that enables all Americans to thrive.

Obama wants to stand for a peaceful, generous, encompassing approach that would bring all Americans, but not just Americans, the whole of international society, together to advance civilization towards what we all understand is necessary to advance. Because of that he's being subjected to very serious rejections from the reactionary portion of the system, which, unfortunately, is the dominant portion.

all mankind, not excluding Americans, are sinners--miserable sinners, as even no few Bostonians themselves nowadays contritely respond in the liturgy.

When there are starving people in the world, it seems wrong that so many of us Americans eat as much for entertainment as for nourishment.

Everything that came out of Europe, every blue-eyed thing, is already an American. And as long as you and I have been over here, we aren't Americans yet.

Americans are not brought up with meter. They're not brought up with poetry. If you try to get them to recite, they're too embarrassed.

I have always fancied that the end of the world will be when some enormous boiler, heated to three thousand millions of atmospheric pressure, shall explode and blow up the globe. ... They [the Americans] are great boilermakers.

It's difficult to talk to people who whisper even at home, afraid of Americans eavesdropping on them. It's not a figure of speech, not a joke, I'm serious.

For the first time in history, we declared war without financing it. Americans have not been asked to pay for it through taxes.