Debate Quotes - Page 30

• Political success is often dependent on the ability to be heard above the din of controversy and debate and to set a course with one's own compass.

  Madeleine M. Kunin

  Political, Politics, Compass

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• The Shah regarded politics as the province of demagoguery, an art in which only charlatans could excel. He had no time for what he saw as the tedious process of achieving consensus through debate and discussion and tried to justify his solitary exercise of power by insisting it was what Iran needed to catch up with lost time. He believed he was more patriotic than anyone else and needed no advice on how best to promote and protect the highest interests of the nation.

  Mohammed Reza Pahlavi

  Art, Patriotic, Exercise

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• Abject flattery and indiscriminate assentation degrade, as much as indiscriminate contradiction and noisy debate disgust. But a modest assertion of one's own opinion, and a complaisant acquiescence in other people's, preserve dignity.

  Doug Stanhope

  People, Acquiescence, Dignity

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• We can't accommodate terrorism. When someone uses the slaughter of innocent people to advance a so-called political cause, at that point the political cause becomes immoral and unjust and they should be eliminated from any serious discussion, any serious debate.

  Rudy Giuliani

  People, Political, Use

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• The debate can be put in the form of the question: Resolved, that the best of money managers cannot be demonstrated to be able to deliver the goods of superior portfolio-selection performance. Any jury that reviews the evidence, and there is a great deal of relevant evidence, must at least come out with the Scottish verdict: Superior investment performance is unproved.

  Paul Samuelson

  Investing, Able, Portfolios

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• Alas, how can the poor souls live in Concord when you preachers sow amongst them in your sermons debate and discord? They look to you for light and you bring them darkness. Amend these crimes, I exhort you, and set forth God's word truly, both by true preaching and giving a good example, or else, I, whom God has appointed his vicar and high minister here, will see these divisions extinct, and these enormities corrected...

  Henry VIII of England

  Light, Giving, Soul

  "Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, of the Reign of Henry VIII" by John Sherren Brewer, Robert Henry, Great Britain. Public Record Office, (vol. XX, part 2, p. 513), 1862.

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• A genuinely political society, in which discussion and debate are an essential technique, is a society full of risks.

  Moses Finley

  Political, Risk, Technique

  "Democracy Ancient And Modern". Book by Moses Finley (Second Edition). Chapter 4, Socrates and After, p. 140, 1985.

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• The DEFENSE of anything is UNTENABLE. The only way to defend anything is to ATTACK, and if you ever forget that, then you will lose every battle you are ever engaged in, whether it is in terms of personal conversation, public debate, or a court of law. NEVER BE INTERESTED IN CHARGES. DO, yourself, much MORE CHARGING, and you will WIN.

  L. Ron Hubbard

  Winning, Law, Battle

  "New trailer for The Master, which is still totally not about Scientology please don't sue us" by Vince Mancini, uproxx.com. August 28, 2012.

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• While we bemoan the decline of literacy, computers discount words in favor of pictures and pictures in favor of video. While we fret about the decreasing cogency of public debate, computers dismiss linear argument and promote fast, shallow romps across the information landscape. While we worry about basic skills, we allow into the classroom software that will do a student's arithmetic or correct his spelling.

  David Gelernter

  Skills, Worry, Video

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• The "family" has clearly emerged anew in the late 1970s as a central subject for discussion, debate, research and writing in bothscholarly and popular arenas. Anxiety over whether or not the family as a basic social institution is dying has diminished. In its stead has emerged a fairly broad consensus around the position that the family is "here to stay," but that it certainly is changing.

  Sheila Kamerman

  Change, Writing, Anxiety

  Sheila B. Kamerman (1980). “Parenting in an unresponsive society: managing work and family life”, Free Pr

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• I and my bosom must debate awhile, and then I would no other company.

  William Shakespeare

  Thoughtful, Thinking, Meditation

  William Shakespeare, Samuel Ayscough, Fenton John Anthony Hort, Nicholas Rowe (1790). “Shakspeare's Dramatic Works: With Explanatory Notes”, p.68

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• I'm not a writer who's preaching some particular philosophy or something but the big questions do concern me and I like to make my readers think and debate and argue with each other and look at some aspect of the world or some act of governance or war or power and have an angle they haven't considered before, and that's something I strive for and hopefully have accomplished.

  George R. R. Martin

  Philosophy, War, Thinking

  "EIBF 2014: George R.R. Martin on Game Of Thrones, writing". www.denofgeek.com. August 15, 2014.

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• I am of the generation of writers who can get instant feedback from readers within hours of publication. The fan forum is extraordinary - readers from all over the world coming together to discuss, argue and debate scenes and characters from a novel. They add a layer to the story that I cannot write and yes, I will participate in that conversation and answer questions. After all, they are the people I'm writing for and their enthusiasm and questions really pushes me to raise the bar.

  Michael Scott

  Writing, Character, People

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• I never really expected "Hurricane" to be censored and banned around the world, but I think the good thing that came from it was that it created a dialogue, a conversation, a debate and a discussion. And that's a great thing. It brought all of us together in a unique way. And it made us look a little deeper in ourselves. I think it's a good thing.

  Jared Leto

  Thinking, Unique, Together

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• There's this big debate that goes on in America about what rights are: Civil rights, human rights, what they are? it's an artificial debate. Because everybody has rights. Everybody has rights - I don't care who you are, what you do, where you come from, how you were born, what your race or creed or color is. You have rights. Everybody's got rights.

  Julian Bond

  America, Rights, Race

  Interview with Heidi Williamson, www.americanprogress.org. February 22, 2013.

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• In the West everybody recognizes the need for a private sector, pretty much, even the one Socialist group understands this now, and so there tends to be debate about how much public sector intervention you think is needed for a variety of reasons, and there are very important differences on party lines that should be fought out.

  Barney Frank

  Party, Thinking, Differences

  "The Political Scene: Barney's Frank Opinions". Interview with Ryan Lizza, www.newyorker.com. December 9, 2011.

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• I'm completely fascinated by the health-care debate going on in the United States, especially by posters of Obama with a little mustache drawn on his upper lip. Is that what Hitler is really known for, his health-care plan? To quote Bill Maher, "I haven't seen this many pissed-off old white people since they cancelled 'Murder She Wrote.'"

  David Sedaris

  White, People, Mustache

  "Ask the Author Live: David Sedaris". Live chat, www.newyorker.com. August 14, 2009.

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• We have a violence problem in America. And no one is having a debate about the violence problem. And I think this is a missed opportunity to have an honest and open conversation in this country about why these horrifying things are happening, not simply what they're using to carry this out, but why are people doing this to begin with?

  Marco Rubio

  Country, Thinking, Opportunity

  Source: alter.newsweek.msnbc.com

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• Journalism is a way of voicing opinion, of participating in the political, social, or cultural debate.

  Mario Vargas Llosa

  Political, Way, Opinion

  "Interview With Mario Vargas Llosa". Interview with Katharyn Rodemann, www.texasmonthly.com. November 2002.

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• To debate political objectives, views, and goals is the most American thing conceivable.

  Lou Reed

  Views, Goal, Political

  Source: www.interviewmagazine.com

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• He [Hugo Chavez] put poverty at the heart of political debate. Rightly so, given the country's immense inequality and poverty. He invested heavily in social programs such as literacy, health clinics, and education. He promoted Venezuela's indigenous culture and urged compatriots to take pride in its pre-Columbian history. He called time on the US treating Latin America as its backyard.

  Rory Carroll

  Country, Latin, Heart

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• I am not saying that I want to ban Islam. I want less Islam in Europe because it doesn't allow any room for debate.

  Geert Wilders

  Europe, Islam, Want

  "Merkel Is Afraid". Interview with Walter Mayr and René Pfister, www.spiegel.de. November 9, 2010.

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• Most people would agree that the details matter when it faces the user. But where the real debate is on things that don't face the user.

  Keith Rabois

  Real, People, Details

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• Scientists blame the audience for being too stupid, shallow, or lazy to understand. There has been a fascinating debate in the blogosphere lately about communicating science to the public, and it's clear that most scientists just don't get it. They can't be bothered to talk to real people. Nobody will care about your issues if the price they have to pay is listening to a long lecture from Morton the science bug.

  Mark Powell

  Real, Stupid, Issues

  Source: www.treehugger.com

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• Debate doesn’t really change things. It gets you bogged in deeper. If you can address or reopen the subject with something new, something from a different angle, then there is some hope. ... People are suddenly gazing at something else and pausing for a moment. And for the duration of that gaze and pause, they are like reflectors of the totality of their own knowledge and/or ignorance. That’s something poetry can do for you, it can entrance you for a moment above the pool of your own consciousness and your own possibilities.

  Seamus Heaney

  Ignorance, People, Different

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