Popular quotes about Public! Wisdom and inspiration are here! | page 4
I think polling is important because it gives a voice to the people. It gives a quantitative, independent assessment of what the public feels as opposed to what experts or pundits think the public feels. So often it provides a quick corrective on what's thought to be the conventional wisdom about public opinion. There are any number of examples that I could give you about how wrong the experts are here in Washington, in New York and elsewhere about public opinion that are revealed by public opinion polls.
Andrew KohutMy heart breaks living in southern Utah on the edge of America's Redrock Wilderness, witnessing what the Bush Administration's policies regarding oil and gas exploitation are doing to our public lands that belong to all Americans. Their policy is not about the public or the public's best interest. It is about the oil and gas corporations' best interests. The Secretary of the Interior is urging the Bureau of Land Management to support the gas and oil industry's most extreme drilling scenario in some of the American West's most pristine and fragile areas without proper legal and public input.
Terry Tempest WilliamsComplaints are everywhere heard from our most considerate and virtuous citizens, equally the friends of public and private faith, and of public and personal liberty, that our governments are too unstable, that the public good is disregarded in the conflicts of rival parties, and that measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority.
James MadisonThe police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.
Robert PeelI have looked at public opinion polls in France in the late 1940s and early 1950s during the height of Marshall Plan aid. They had a very negative attitude towards the United States then. There were negative attitudes towards the United States because of Vietnam. There were negative attitudes about the United States when Reagan wanted to deploy intermediate range ballistic missiles. I don't think the president should base his foreign policy on American public opinion polls, let alone foreign public opinion polls.
John BoltonAmerican public opinion, as you can see in the polls, radically changed from being against airstrikes to being heavily in favor that [President Obama] decided to do airstrikes. This is a classic example of leading from behind where he waits for public opinion. And now it's the public who's demanding he do something.
Charles KrauthammerIn effective, sustained citizen action, people learn the skills of public life with which to act effectively. "Commons," or the common wealth-the public goods that are objects of sustainable public action-become not only occasions for collaboration by invaluable sources of citizen education in their own right because they are the occasions for learning such skills.
Harry BoyteYou have celebrities who are pushed to the brink of a public meltdown, and so the public thinks that every person in the public eye has dirty secrets that they're keeping, or isn't what they seem, or is masking it and faking sincerity, faking authenticity, faking being surprised at award shows when you win a Grammy.
Taylor SwiftThe most absurd public opinion polls are those on taxes. Now, if there is one thing we know about taxes, it is that people do not want to pay them. If they wanted to pay them, there would be no need for taxes. People would gladly figure out how much of their money that the government deserves and send it in. And yet we routinely hear about opinion polls that reveal that the public likes the tax level as it is and might even like it higher. Next they will tell us that the public thinks the crime rate is too low, or that the American people would really like to be in more auto accidents.
Llewellyn RockwellI am for a government rigorously frugal & simple, applying all the possible savings of the public revenue to the discharge of the national debt; and not for a multiplication of officers & salaries merely to make partisans, & for increasing, by every device, the public debt, on the principle of its being a public blessing.
Thomas JeffersonI really don't want to produce artwork that does not have meaning beyond simple decorative values. I want to use public space to create a public voice, and a public consciousness about the presence of people who are, in fact, the majority of the population but who are not represented in any visual way. By telling their stories we are giving voice to the voiceless and visualizing the whole of the American story.
Judy BacaLet us hold fast the great truth, that communities are responsible, as well as individuals; that no government is respectable which is not just. Without unspotted purity of public faith, without sacred public principle, fidelity, and honor, no machinery of laws, can give dignity to political society.
Daniel WebsterAmerica's skyscrapers were not built by public funds nor for a public purpose: they were built by the energy, initiative and wealth of private individuals for personal profit. And, instead of impoverishing the people, these skyscrapers, as they rose higher and higher, kept raising the people's standard of living - including the inhabitants of the slums.
Ayn RandI want the public as well as libraries and schools to enjoy unlimited access to public-domain books. This means no charges for these kind of texts themselves.
Tom PetersLet me just say this, and I want to say this to the televison audience: I made my mistakes, but in all of my years of public life, I have never profited, never profited from public service
Richard M. NixonGovernment grows despite repeated failures to serve the public well because government's purpose no longer is to serve the public. Government now serves primarily the interests of those who work for the government.
Jack KellyI fell in love with the public, the public fell in love with me, and I tried to keep it that way.
Julia ChildI think corporations should give more attention to this suffering and should wait to invest until there is a responsible government in Burma. I do not think it is a good idea to separate economics from politics; in fact, I do not think economics can be separated from politics It's quite understandable that many business concerns think only about their own profits It's up to the public to put as much pressure as it can on these companies, through shareholder resolutions and public actions.
Aung San Suu KyiI've been alienating my public since I was 20 years old. When 'American Buffalo' came out on Broadway, people would storm out and say, 'How dare he use that kind of language!' Of course I'm alienating the public! That's what they pay me for.
David MametThe fact that the theatregoing public likes my music is no credit to me. There are many other composers who write better music that the public doesn't like.
Jerome KernA funny thing happened to the First Amendment on its way to the public forum. According to the Supreme Court, money is now speech and corporations are now people. But when real people without money assemble to express their dissatisfaction with the political consequences of this, theyโre treated as public nuisances and evicted.
Robert ReichThe path to a better future goes directly through our public schools. I have nothing against private schools, parochial schools and home schooling, and I think that parents with the means and inclination should choose whatever they believe is best for their children. But those choices cannot compete, and cannot come at the expense of what has been -- and what must always be -- the great equalizer in our society, a free and equal public education.
Howard DeanI think in terms of me shying away from modelling, I would like to clarify in some way that I was taking a break from many things in my life and obviously what people in the public see is that I'm pulling away from what is more public.
Gemma WardWe have a large public that is very ignorant about public affairs and very susceptible to simplistic slogans by candidates who appear out of nowhere, have no track record, but mouth appealing slogans
Zbigniew BrzezinskiDo I regret taking the company public? Yes and no. Yes, because it put us under enormous pressure for a young company to go public at that point in its history, something you never could have done in the old days.
David TalbotEconomics now drives politics. This gives us a system in which the relationship between power and politics is no longer fused. Power is global. We have an elite that now floats in global flows. It could care less about the nation-state, and it could care less about traditional forms of politics. Hence, it makes no political concessions whatsoever. It attacks unions, it attacks public schools, it attacks public goods. It doesn't believe in the social contract.
Henry GirouxI want to thank the efforts of the American Public Health Association and its 200-plus partners who have organized events around the Nation that serve to raise everyone's awareness of the need to improve public health.
Lois CappsAll free governments, whatever their name, are in reality governments by public opinion ; and it is on the quality of this public opinion that their prosperity depends. It is, therefore, their first duty to purify the element from which they draw the breath of life.
James Russell LowellThe founders of this nation understood that private morality is the fount from whence sound public policy springs. Replying to Washington's first inaugural address, the Senate stated: "We feel, sir, the force and acknowledge the justness of the observation that the foundation of our national policy should be lain in private morality. If individuals be not influenced by moral principles it is in vain to look for public virtue."
Thomas G. WestOne would expect that private property taken by eminent domain would become land available for public use such as parks and roads. Unfortunately, this decision creates a loophole for government to manipulate the definition of public use simply to generate greater tax revenue.
Jim RyunAnyhow, there simply isnt enough room in the museums Fishes Hall, so weve decided to pretend to the public that a whale is actually a mammal without any legs. Its pathetically ridiculous-I mean to say, just look at the thing, its a gigantic fish if I ever saw one-but mums the word! In my experience the public will believe just about anything, so long as you write it down on a little piece of card.
Gideon DefoeAll truth is valuable, and satirical criticism may be considered as useful when it rectifies error and improves judgment; he that refines the public taste is a public benefactor.
Samuel JohnsonThis wasnโt just an attack against the Boston Marathon... It was an attack against the American public and our democratic use of the streets. We have used our public roadways for annual parades, protest marches, presidential inaugurations, marathons, and all manner of other events. The roads belong to us, and their use represents an important part of our free and democratic tradition.
Amby BurfootBecause the task of a political leader is to do what he believes is better for his country. Sometimes the public opinion is in favor; sometimes the public opinion needs a little bit more time to understand things.
Jose Maria AznarThe public, as a whole, does not demand or appreciate the pure expression of beauty. Its cultured members expect to find in poetry, if anything, repose from material and nervous anxiety; an apt or chiselled phrase strokes the appetites and tickles the imagination. The more general public merely enjoys its platitudes and truisms jerked on to the understanding in line and rhyme; truth put into metre sounds overwhelmingly true.
Harold MonroWith the corporatization and privatization of higher education, it is increasingly more difficult for colleges and universities to expand and deepen democratic public life, produce engaged critical citizens, and operate as democratic public spheres.
Henry GirouxHistory will also afford frequent opportunities of showing the necessity of a public religion, from its usefulness to the public; the advantage of a religious character among private persons; the mischiefs of superstition, and the excellency of the Christian religion above all others, ancient or modern.
Benjamin FranklinSociety as a whole is better off when information is available to the public. Whether you are talking about how to prevent disease, or about who does the best job of treating disease, it is useful to provide as much information to the public as possible.
Dave ObeyMitt Romney has to convince the American public that they need to do something they're not usually inclined to do - replace a sitting president with a challenger. And unlike in 1980 and 1992, when the public was persuaded to do just that, the incumbent president has not been weakened by a primary opponent.
William KristolImproving the quality of our lives should be the ultimate target of public policies. But public policies can only deliver best fruit if they are based on reliable tools to measure the improvement they seek to produce in our lives.
Jose Angel GurriaThe truth is, that, even with the most secure tenure of office, during good behavior, the danger is not, that the judges will be too firm in resisting public opinion, and in defence of private rights or public liberties; but, that they will be ready to yield themselves to the passions, and politics, and prejudices of the day.
Joseph StoryI've been not only articulating the dissatisfaction with Albany, I've been acting on it. I've been very aggressive in bringing public integrity cases and public corruption cases and bringing cases against sitting legislators
Andrew CuomoLaw enforcement officers are never 'off duty.' They are dedicated public servants who are sworn to protect public safety at any time and place that the peace is threatened. They need all the help that they can get.
Barbara BoxerSending our kids in my family to private school was a big, big, big deal. And it was a giant family discussion. But it was a circular conversation, really, because ultimately we don't have a choice. I mean, I pay for a private education and I'm trying to get the one that most matches the public education that I had, but that kind of progressive education no longer exists in the public system. It's unfair.
Matt DamonFrom the viewpoint of economic democracy, the capitalism-socialism debate was a debate between private and state capitalism (i.e., the private or public employment system), and the debate was as misframed as would be a debate between the private or public ownership of slaves.
David P. Ellerman