Latest Ralph Nader Quotes from Interviews

Quotes about:

• I finally came to Washington. That's when something happened. The Motor Vehicle Act of 1966, even though it was irregularly enforced - sometimes very little under Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan - it saved over 200,000 lives, millions of injuries prevented or reduced in severity.

  Ralph Nader

  Sometimes, Injury, Vehicle

  "Making Government and Business Accountable". Academy of Achievement Interview, www.achievement.org. February 16, 1991.

• When I went to Harvard Law School I became interested in the connection between legal standards for safety and automobile engineering design. At that time, it was all blamed on a "nut behind the wheel," so-called, the driver. But I knew that the vehicle had a great deal to do with that because I had come across some Air Force-sponsored studies at medical schools. The Air Force found they were losing more men on the highways than in the Korean War.

  Ralph Nader

  War, School, Men

  Source: www.achievement.org

• I always say there's no ticket of admission for active citizenship. Anybody can get through that gate, and anybody can ask that basic question that gets the ball rolling.

  Ralph Nader

  Citizenship, Gates

  Source: www.achievement.org

• One time when I was nine or ten years old, I came home from school...and my dad said to me, 'Well, Ralph, what did you learn in school today? Did you learn how to believe or did you learn how to think?' So, I'm saying to myself, 'What's the difference between the two?'.

  Ralph Nader

  Dad, Believe, Home

  Source: www.achievement.org

• One day at Princeton, I noticed there were dead birds on the pavement between the campus buildings, where very large trees were. It turns out it was DDT. At the time, in the early '50s, no one thought DDT was dangerous to anybody but insects. I went down to the Daily Princetonian, the college paper, and tried to persuade them to do a story. They said, "Naw, there's nothing wrong." But that taught me a very important lesson. One, that newspaper people can get very jaded. Second, that you might know something, like an expert chemistry professor, you are not going to apply what you know.

  Ralph Nader

  College, People, Bird

• What we need to recognize, less than 1 percent of the people organized around issues that are already supported by conservatives and liberals, and there are a lot of them that aren't publicized, back home, can overcome corporate forces in Washington.

  Ralph Nader

  Home, Issues, People

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• Congress is the most powerful branch. It can expand a progressive society, or it can block a progressive society.

  Ralph Nader

  Powerful, Block, Branches

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• For anybody here who's very worried about domestic priorities, just consider we have created, with this war on terrorism, more fighters, more countries embroiled. They're learning new weapons. They're learning new techniques. They're coming here in social media. The lone wolf thing is expanding. And once that blows here, then forget about domestic priorities.

  Ralph Nader

  Country, War, Blow

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• All empires eventually destroy themselves. That's the record of history.

  Ralph Nader

  Records, Empires

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• Militaristic foreign policy is destroying America.

  Ralph Nader

  America, Destroying, Foreign Policy

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• I think we should make a closer link between domestic policy and an interventionist militaristic foreign policy.

  Ralph Nader

  Thinking, Links, Should

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• The debate corporation is a corporation. It's funded by corporations. It's relayed by media corporations to the public. It's created by the two parties, which are corporations. We should have public presidential debates all over America run by public institutions.

  Ralph Nader

  Running, Party, Media

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• That's why I call the Senate the graveyard of democracy, because even when you have 58 senators, they can block it and block it and block it.

  Ralph Nader

  Block, Democracy, Graveyard

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• There are very significant ways around America on how to break its grip, which is, of course, a way to exclude dissenting voices before tens of millions of people.

  Ralph Nader

  Voice, America, People

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• Congress is the great enabler, constitutionally, for progressive society, and it's the great graveyard, the way it's been behaving, against a prosperous society, or another billionaire or two.

  Ralph Nader

  Two, Progressive Society, Way

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• Let's look at the Trump and Bernie Sanders insurgencies. They were basically insurgencies against the Republican and Democratic Party. Bernie Sanders made no mistake about it. And, of course, Trump didn't either. And they almost won.

  Ralph Nader

  Mistake, Party, Looks

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• The true danger is the expansion of empire and the huge diversion of public budgets overseas at the neglect of domestic necessities, including, for example, a major public works program to employ millions of people. The Democrats want that. The Republicans may be pressured from back home to want it, but it hasn't happened yet under the Obama administration.

  Ralph Nader

  Home, People, Expansion

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• Hillary Clinton's ready to pivot to Asia and provoke China. So are the Republicans. It's on domestic issues that there will be a gridlock.

  Ralph Nader

  Issues, Asia, Republican

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• Hillary Clinton's ready to pick a fight with Putin. So are the Republicans.

  Ralph Nader

  Fighting, Republican, Putin

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• Hillary Clinton's never seen a weapons system or a war she hasn't liked.

  Ralph Nader

  War, Weapons, Clinton

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• Hillary Clinton is going to find common ground with the Republicans on foreign and military affairs. They both want to enhance the military budget.

  Ralph Nader

  Military, Want, Common

  Source: www.democracynow.org

• It's all these pundits, all these consultants, and the candidates, as if they're in a bubble leaving democracy off-limits.

  Ralph Nader

  Leaving, Democracy, Limits

  Source: www.cpa-connecticut.com

• What's interesting is this election year has made the citizen groups off-limits. All these citizen groups? - local, state, national? - that really do things and improve the country, they're never asked to be in these electoral campaign discussions.

  Ralph Nader

  Country, Years, Interesting

  Source: www.cpa-connecticut.com

• We have a Democratic Party that cannot defend the American people from the worst Republican Party in history because it's a Democratic Party of war and Wall Street.

  Ralph Nader

  Wall, War, Party

  Source: www.cpa-connecticut.com

• We have two parties who are basically hijacking our country for their corporate paymasters. And if we focus on 535 members of Congress, that's not all that many, we're going to see a fast turnaround. So focus all your concerns, all the information, the kind of agenda the Green Party has. Turn it right on your Senators and Representatives.

  Ralph Nader

  Country, Party, Two

  Source: www.cpa-connecticut.com