Public Opinion Quotes - Page 10

• As believers in democracy we have not only the right but the duty to question existing mechanisms of, say, suffrage and to inquire whether some functional organization would not serve to formulate and manifest public opinion better than the existing methods. It is not irrelevant to the point that a score of passages could be cited in which Jefferson refers to the American Government as an experiment.

  John Dewey

  Government, Organization, Democracy

  John Dewey, Jo Ann Boydston, Steven M. Cahn (2008). “The Later Works, 1925-1953: 1938-1939”, p.175, SIU Press

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• By more than two to one Americans do not consider what Kevorkian did, injecting a terminally ill patient with legal drugs at the patient's request, to be the same as murder. You may want to note that laws are not supposed to be enforced on the basis of public opinion polls.

  Dan Rather

  Law, Two, Drug

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• Public opinion aside, it will be up to the future pope to continue John Paul II's journey to sainthood. Many of the late pope's followers believe he is already there.

  Chris Matthews

  Believe, Journey, Followers

  Source: www.nbcnews.com

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• Public opinion should not be confused with popular sentiment. Popular sentiment is what people say to one another around their dinner tables. Popular opinion is what they say to callers from polling organizations.

  Richard Brookhiser

  Confused, Organization, People

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• Public opinion exists only where there are no ideas.

  Oscar Wilde

  Ideas, Opinion, No Idea

  Oscar Wilde (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Oscar Wilde (Illustrated)”, p.1670, Delphi Classics

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• After a decade of war you have this Pentagon-military apparatus run amok using resources that they shouldn't be to try to manipulate U.S. public opinion.

  Michael Hastings

  Running, Military, War

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

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• I am a pop artist, so my medium is public opinion and the world is my canvas.

  Kanye West

  Artist, World, Canvas

  "Kanye West Receives Honorary Doctorate From SAIC: Listen" by Eric Torres, pitchfork.com. May 11, 2015.

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• What the tender and poetic youth dreams to-day, and conjures up with inarticulate speech, is to-morrow the vociferated result of public opinion, and the day after is the character of nations.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Dream, Character, Speech

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• If the government is vulnerable to public opinion, then famines are a dreadfully bad thing to have. You can’t win many elections after a famine, and you don’t like being criticized by newspapers, opposition parties in parliament, and so on. Democracy gives the government an immediate political incentive to act.

  Amartya Sen

  Party, Winning, Government

  Interview with David Barsamian, www.sharedhost.progressive.org. September 29, 2011.

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• Publicity is the only thing some people fear. An aroused public opinion has been the cause of most reforms. Telling the truth is perhaps the pacifist's only weapon. Over and over again, even the suggestion that one may publish the facts has changed a scornful, bullying opponent into an almost subservient helper. But how dangerous it is!

  Muriel Lester

  Bullying, People, Suggestions

  Muriel Lester (1937). “It Occurred to Me”

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• I am sort of proud that I think radio has become a dominant influence in shaping public opinion. Good radio paints the picture for the audience. The audience has to be actively involved. Sometimes, in television, you can get lulled into sleep watching the picture, not listening to what you're hearing.

  Rush Limbaugh

  Sleep, Thinking, Listening

  "Transcript: Rush Limbaugh on 'Your World'". "Your World with Neil Cavuto,", Fox News Show, www.foxnews.com. February 9, 2006.

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• One of the things that you learn, having been in this [President's] office for four years, is the old adage of Abraham Lincoln's. That with public opinion there's nothing you can't do and without public opinion there's very little you can get done.

  Barack Obama

  Years, Office, President

  Source: www.nbcnews.com

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• Public opinion in Egypt is very antagonistic to the way the dictatorship, Mubarak dictatorship, interpreted relations with Israel. Very antagonistic.

  Noam Chomsky

  Israel, Egypt, Way

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• Public opinion is the judgment of the incapable many opposed to that of the discerning few.

  Elbert Hubbard

  Judgment, Discerning, Incapable

  Elbert Hubbard, Bert Hubbard (1923). “Selected writings of Elbert Hubbard: his mintage of wisdom, coined from a life of love, laughter and work”

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• To serve the public interest is not the same as being a servant of public opinion.

  Sidney Hook

  Interest, Servant, Opinion

  Sidney Hook (1965). “Political Power and Personal Freedom: Critical Studies in Democracy, Communism, and Civil Rights”

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• Every man speaks of public opinion, and means by public opinion, public opinion minus his opinion.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Mean, Men, Speak

  Gilbert K. Chesterton (2013). “The Essential Gilbert K. Chesterton”, p.170, Simon and Schuster

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• When we are high and airy hundreds say
  That if we hold that flight they'll leave the place,
  While those same hundreds mock another day
  Because we have made our art of common things.

  William Butler Yeats

  Art, Another Day, Common

  William Butler Yeats (1931). “Later Poems”, p.72, Library of Alexandria

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• You have to take risks on policy. You can't be a politician, wringing your hands, worried about what the public opinion polls are saying or worried about the negative attacks. If you believe in something, go fight for it.

  Scott Pelley

  Believe, Fighting, Hands

  Source: www.cbsnews.com

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• Happy is he who looks only into his work to know if it will succeed, never into the times or the public opinion; and who writes from the love of imparting certain thoughts and not from the necessity of sale - who writes always to the unknown friend.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Writing, Looks, Succeed

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2014). “The Heart of Emerson's Journals”, p.231, Courier Corporation

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• The well of public opinion has been well and truly poisoned by the Iraq episode.

  David Cameron

  Spring, Iraq, History

  "MPs vote down military intervention in Syria: Politics live blog" by Andrew Sparrow, www.theguardian.com. August 29, 2013.

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• The whole land seems aroused to discussion on the province of woman, and I am glad of it. We are willing to bear the brunt of thestorm, if we can only be the means of making a break in that wall of public opinion which lies right in the way of woman's rights, true dignity, honor and usefulness.

  Angelina Grimke

  Wall, Lying, Mean

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• The more efficient causes of progress seem to consist of a good education during youth whilst the brain is impressible, and of a high standard of excellence, inculcated by the ablest and best men, embodied in the laws, customs and traditions of the nation, and enforced by public opinion.

  Charles Darwin

  Men, Law, Brain

  Charles Darwin (2016). “The Descent of Man (Diversion Classics)”, p.199, Diversion Books

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• Public opinion actually applauds the young woman venturing into the business world, but it still obstinately (and quite illogically) protects the young man in his sacred right to know nothing of housework.

  Crystal Eastman

  Business, Men, World

  Crystal Eastman (1978). “Crystal Eastman on Women and Revolution”, Oxford University Press, USA

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• Neither the Church nor modern public opinion condemns petting, provided it stops short at a certain point.

  Bertrand Russell

  Church, Modern, Certain

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Unpopular Essays”, p.80, Routledge

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• Government is being founded on opinion, the opinion of the public, even when it is wrong, ought to be respected to a certain degree.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Government, Degrees, Certain

  Thomas Jefferson (2010). “The Works of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence 1789-1792”, p.194, Cosimo, Inc.

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