Popular quotes about Americans! Wisdom and inspiration are here!
I wonder what it means when Americans say I'm an American. In Britain the culture is basically the same from one end of the country to the other. And when I came here and I saw Americans who live, I don't know, in you know, Northwestern California as opposed to Americans who live in Louisiana, as opposed to Americans who live in the Nevada desert. English even is literally a picture that I have in my mind of an oak tree in the field, a single oak in a green field. And also when I think of my Russian roots, it's the landscape that I connect with as more than maybe the poetry or the drama.
Helen MirrenOne question that has always intrigued me is what happens to demonic beings when immigrants move from their homelands. Irish-Americans remember the fairies. Norwegian-Americans the nisser, Greek-Americans the vrykรณlakas, but only in relation to events remembered in the Old Country. When I once asked why such demons are not seen in America, my informants giggled confusedly and said, 'They're scared to pass the ocean, it's too far,' pointing out that Christ and the apostles never came to American.
Richard Mercer DorsonThose are values that help guide not just my family's Christian faith, but that of Jewish Americans, and Muslim Americans; nonbelievers and Americans of all backgrounds. And no one better embodies that spirit of service than the men and women who wear our country's uniform and their families.
Barack ObamaAmericans really don't know much about chess. But I think when I beat Spassky, that Americans will take a greater interest in chess. Americans like winners.
Bobby FischerDonald Trump claims - he did interview after the debate where he said, well, gosh, you can't find Americans to do these jobs to be waiters or waitresses or bellhops.What ridiculous nonsense. "The New York Times" reported roughly 300 Americans applied for those jobs. He only hired 17. Instead, he brought in foreign workers, because they're captive workers, because you can pay them less because they can't leave.
Ted CruzAmericans love to fight, traditionally. All real Americans love the sting and clash of battle.
George S. PattonWe are tasked to rebuild not just a damaged economy, and a debt-ridden balance sheet, but to do so by drawing forth the best that is in our fellow citizens. If we would summon the best from Americans, we must assume the best about them. If we don't believe in Americans, who will?
Mitch DanielsMy concern is to develop a North American type of anarchism that comes out of the American tradition, or that at least can be communicated to Americans and that takes into consideration that Americans are not any longer people of European background.
Murray BookchinYou know, I have never seen the level of anger and frustration and resentment and even disgust among millions of Americans toward the media. And I think there are a lot of self-inflicted wounds here, big mistakes that are not learned from, but also a lot of it the byproduct of a campaign in which the press appeared to be out of touch with the frustration of the many millions of Americans who helped put Donald Trump into the White House and just the way we botched it.
Howard KurtzGovernment has the responsibility to provide the climate in which Americans, all Americans, have an opportunity for good jobs; and not only for good jobs, but an opportunity if they have the ability and the desire, to be owners and managers, to have a piece of the action, because if they have a piece of the action, then they believe in the system rather than fighting against it.
Richard M. NixonI think Americans are good, but America will be taken over and destroyed from the inside by the Zionist lobby. The Americans do not see this. They are getting decadent. Zionists will use this to destroy them.
Muammar al-GaddafiI know that if a team had a derogatory name for African Americans, I would help those who helped extinguish that name. I have quite a few friends who are Native Americans. And even if I didnโt have Native American friends, the name of the team is disrespectful.
Mike CareyI'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.
Mike HuckabeeIt is, I think, an indisputable fact that Americans are, as Americans, the most self-conscious people in the world, and the most addicted to the belief that the other nations of the earth are in a conspiracy to under value them.
Henry JamesWinston Churchill used to say that we, Americans, try every other option before we finally do the right thing. After everything else is exhausted we eventually do the right thing and I think that's true for Congress as well. And it's important for Americans to remember that politics has always been messy.
Barack ObamaAmericans are ugly unwashed clods that live off of government cheese. If I could, I'd take every living American, grind them up into a fine paste and use that paste to feed the dolphins, because they are neglected by the evil Americans.
Thom YorkeI hope that the mistakes made and suffering imposed upon Japanese Americans nearly 60 years ago will not be repeated against Arab Americans whose loyalties are now being called into question.
Daniel InouyePashtun nationalism is reasserting itself. Its political history spans several hundred years. The Pashtuns are angry at the Americans because, one, they're still being bombed, and two, they perceive that the Americans are backing the Tajik faction, which controls the army and security forces in Kabul.
Ahmed RashidWe are Americans, speaking the same language, adopting the same customs, holding the same general opinions... and shall rise and fall with Americans.
Frederick DouglassAll 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.
Richard H. SteckelAmericans of our own time - minority and majority Americans alike - need the continued guidance that the Voting Rights Act provides. We have come a long way, but more needs to be done.
Elijah CummingsI think we recognize as Americans there are certain things that are just primary to the freedoms and liberties that we enjoy here and religious freedom is one of the most important things we as Americans cherish.
Ann RomneyMost 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.
Anthony BraxtonThe African-American is often used, and has conspired with the rest of America to be used, as a diversion from America's problems. I wish African-Americans would stop contributing to this sideshow. I also wish all African-Americans would cease to sing and dance just for a generation. I think we provide too much entertainment.
Jamaica KincaidThere's a lot of stuff like that that American's don't know and since a lot of Americans don't have a passport, I'll get a passport for them and since a lot of Americans don't know what a war looks like thirty, forty years later and it's still doing damage.
Henry RollinsAmericans who read and think are patriots of the first order. The kind who know enough to roll their eyes whenever anyone tries to claim sole custody of the flag and weild it as a blunt instrument. There are as many ways to love America as there are Americans, and our country needs us all.
Barbara KingsolverI was walking an average of about two and a half miles a day, which is still more than most Americans. Most Americans don't even walk that.
Morgan SpurlockI think that may be the biggest difference between Americans and people elsewhere. Unlike Americans, Canadians know that there are places just as real as Canada. It's a self-centeredness that's a very strange thing.
Jane JacobsThe task that has fallen to us as Americans is to move the conscience of the world, to keep alive the hope and dream of freedom. For if we fail or falter, there'll be no place for the world's oppressed to flee to. This is not a role we sought. We preach no manifest destiny. But like the Americans who brought a new nation into the world 200 years ago, history has asked much of us in our time. Much we've already given; much more we must be prepared to give.
Ronald ReaganWhenever people in that part of the world asked Patterson about the wonders of America, the possibilities and the hope of America, Patterson would say that it was a good and fine place but all the Americans were running it into the ground and that it would be a far better place if it had no Americans.
Edward P. JonesWe're Americans, and we have a rendezvous with destiny . . . No people who have ever lived on this earth have fought harder, paid a higher price for freedom, or done more to advance the dignity of man than Americans.
Ronald ReaganI 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.
Roger EbertBut 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.
Rick PerryWhat the Japanese are, are the Americans of the 21st century. Essentially what is objectionable about them is what was objectionable about Americans when we had the ball. However, they are committed in a way that American technology is not.
Howard RheingoldAs americans I think it's harder for us to have a relationship with opera because the access to it is so limited.
Jacob HashimotoPersonally I get so much of my inspiration from women in other countries, so I don't feel like American women are the leaders and I don't agree with the notion that Americans can accomplish more or do more. But I do think that what we can uniquely do here in America is mobilize and galvanize a lot of these ideas and resources. It's a war of ideas. We, Islamic women, are very well supported in this country by institutions, academic and nonprofit, that are already in the field endorsing women's rights and tolerance. The women in other communities have been the pioneers in this work.
Asra NomaniI 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.
Jules VerneFew expected very much of Franklin Roosevelt on Inauguration Day in 1933. Like Barack Obama seventy-six years later, he was succeeding a failed Republican president, and Americans had voted for change. What that change might be Roosevelt never clearly said, probably because he himself didn't know.
Russell BakerIllegal immigration is praised only by those who benefit directly from it, whether in the familial sense of inexpensive nannies, cooks, or gardeners; or in the corporate interest of cheap labor in the hospitality industries, agriculture, and construction; or in the political sense of new liberal constituents; or in the tribal sense of expanding the so-called La Raza base. But the vast majority of Americans accept that when federal law is ignored, chaos ensues.
Victor Davis HansonLike a majority of Americans in recent years, I came to understand that fear of homosexuality was leading our governments ... to deny the equal rights to an entire segment of our population that are afforded all of us under the Constitution.
Ronnie MusgroveI have a great fear for the moral will of Americans if it takes more than a week to achieve the results.
Michael S. HarperI think it's very important to always make sure that you're talking to the entire coalition and to as many Americans as possible; not to go chasing after one little group or another. The Democrats would bring new groups into their party and not notice that larger groups are going out the back door.
Grover NorquistI'm one of 23 million Americans in recovery who have gone on to live productive lives.
Michael BotticelliI think the media is very much like the inside-the-Beltway crowd. They're not average Americans themselves. They're under a lot of pressure from editors and publishers.
Howard DeanThe Bush Republicans' policies are, the antithesis of patriotic. And so we urge Democrats to reclaim patriotism - to call on all Americans to pull together. And, yes, to sacrifice. Rich people will have to do with fewer tax cuts. Middle class people will need to drive less and switch to more fuel efficient cars . And poor folks - especially young ones - will have to reduce out-of-wedlock pregnancies and other indicia of social pathology.
Paul BegalaFrom the clayey soil of northern Wyoming is mined bentonite, which is used as filler in candy, gum, and lipstick. We Americans are great on fillers, as if what we have, what we are, is not enough. We have a cultural tendency toward denial, but being affluent, we strangle ourselves with what we can buy. We gave only to look at the houses we build to see how we build *against* space, the way we drink against pain and loneliness. We fill up space as if it were a pie shell, with things whose opacity further obstructs our ability to see what is already there.
Gretel Ehrlich