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Politics Quotes by Dick Morris

38 Politics quotes by Dick Morris

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Dick Morris compares some GOP strategies to a human wave that tries to overwhelm opponents with sheer numbers. He stresses that a quick, clear rebuttal can damage an opposing campaign more than a long fight. He also warns that voters must learn to spot lies on TV and that good instincts matter more than polls.

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Spin is overrated. It is strategy, not spin, that wins elections.

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If you're going to be a sexual predator, be a Democrat.

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There is no substitute for a clear vision and a decisive direction.

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Spontaneous combustion of grassroots politics is the future.

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It is from the center that leaders must lead.

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The opposing party rarely causes so much angst as does one's own.

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In fighting scandal, the key is not to overreact.

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...nobody would think of asking the U.N. General Assembly what it thinks because it is dominated by nations with no power and…

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The key to running a campaign on the cheap is to avoid spending money on anything other than projecting a message.

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I probably had 150 meetings with Trent Lott. He has said exactly as many racist things to me as Bill Clinton has,…

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Leadership is a dynamic tension between where a politician thinks his country must go and where his voters want it to go.

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Take whatever position you want, but do take a position, because once you do, ample money awaits you on either side.

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More and more, the Democrats are not merely inconsistent, wrong and/or misguided - they are the worst of all possible things you…

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Every donation received is a potential negative ad. Vetting money is just as important as raising it.

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[T]he harm [Clinton AG] Reno did to American national security in the fight against terror was incalculable.

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The greater informational levels of the voters, their decreasing inhibitions in expressing disagreement, and their greater preference for Jeffersonian direct involvement, all…

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The cost of campaigning has skyrocketed in recent years because of the falloff in TV viewership. With only one-third as many people…

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There is a no-man's land in our politics: on the one hand, bounded by what we know to be true, and on…

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A politician can do what he thinks is right, he just has to be sophisticated in how he goes about it. Those…

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Each morning we sat reading our copy of the New York Times, the Washington Post or the Los Angeles Times and ruminated…

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Franklin Roosevelt didn't poll, because he had great political instincts. Now we have polls; we don't need instincts. But is that a…

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The problem: Democrats have to drop their stupid class-warfare rhetoric. With 74 million Americans owning stock in one form or another, anything…

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Yes' is a far more potent word than 'no' in American politics. By adopting the positions which animate the political agenda for…

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We in politics are accustomed to seeing reality firsthand and then watching its distant cousin, events as portrayed by the media, unfold…

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The most basic decision a modern politician must make is whether to be aggressive or conciliatory.

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The typical presidential staff resents the vice-president even more than they do the first lady.

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There is literally no such thing as an idea that cannot be expressed well and articulately to today's voters in thirty seconds.

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Despite romantic fantasies about caring candidates who learn of America in donut shops, most politicians rely on media to teach them what…

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Today, a politician does not just need public support to win elections; he needs it to govern.

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The key to controlling your own political party, so that it does not eat you alive, is to realize that while Democratic…

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The White House will run itself while the president is away. That's why he has to be sure not to be away…

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... the top 10 percent of incomes pay 70 percent of the income taxes and cast about 25 percent of the vote.

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The Darwinian adaptive trait of our time is the ability to figure out when we are being lied to on television.

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Rebut the negative, and the opposing campaign has not merely lost a skirmish, it has suffered almost irreparable damage. An effective rebuttal…

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Often GOP political strategy seems like the human wave theory of the Chinese military translated to politics. Where Beijing uses masses of…

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We will shortly become like Germany, France, the United Kingdom, or Sweden - a socialist democracy in which the government dominates the…

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Like the battleships of old, omnibus programs present too tempting a target, too easily destroyed by a single attack, to make it…

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The stagnation of the Japanese economy in the past 20 years is eloquent testimony to the fact that government usually gets it…

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More by Dick Morris

Obama's perverse view of fairness threatens to create reverse incentives, militating against growth, jobs, expansion and upward mobility.

Often GOP political strategy seems like the human wave theory of the Chinese military translated to politics. Where Beijing uses masses of soldiers to…

Rebut the negative, and the opposing campaign has not merely lost a skirmish, it has suffered almost irreparable damage. An effective rebuttal makes it…

With a congressional mandate to run the deficit up as high as need be, there is no reason to raise taxes now and risk…

Obama does not believe in individual upward mobility. He would penalize it, tax it, regulate it, inveigh against it and disincentivize it. We will…

In Canada the cancer death rate is 16% higher than in the U.S. because of rationing of medical care. It takes an eight week…

Franklin Roosevelt didn't poll, because he had great political instincts. Now we have polls; we don't need instincts. But is that a change in…

Anybody else who's gotten the president of the United States elected, tell me you are better than I am at it.

The Hispanic population grew by 4.7 percent last year, while blacks expanded by 1.5 percent and whites by a paltry 0.3 percent. Hispanics cast…

Those crazies in Montana who say, 'We're going to kill ATF agents because the UN's going to take over' - well, they're beginning to…

You cannot cover the 50 million new people Obama seeks to cover without more doctors and nurses. But the administration and even the Blue…

I think that the reason Clinton chose Gore was that he was an example of what Clinton was like. He was kind of almost…

The problem: Democrats have to drop their stupid class-warfare rhetoric. With 74 million Americans owning stock in one form or another, anything which helps…

The Darwinian adaptive trait of our time is the ability to figure out when we are being lied to on television.

Public-opinion polls show that Americans split about evenly on civil unions. But when the words 'gay marriage' are presented, they break 3-to-1 against it.