Andrea Mitchell Quotes

In politics things change, in politics timing is important, and in politics, how I move, I don't tell you.

I am determined to elect a president of our choosing this year and one who will be deeply indebted, and who will recognize his indebtedness. Since I am willing to go beyond all limitations on this, I think we should be able to select a candidate and a party who knows the facts of political life....If we select Nixon, then he, I know for sure knows the facts of life.

You can't be entirely unguarded in politics. Even appearing to be unguarded is as much a facade as a reality.

I'm president of the Senate. I'm not a neophyte when it comes to understanding political alignments and misalignments.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid likes to reminisce about being an amateur boxer. But his Senate tenure has often looked like an endless rope-a-dope.

Senator [Bob] Corker has been, first of all, discreet and loyal. He has not signaled the internal mechanisms. He's been pretty honestly saying, I wasn't a real insider in the campaign.

Disloyalty is the secret weapon of the Tory Party.

I think all of these things, there are always names floated - Newt Gingrich's name is out there. Sometimes you just want to make the loyalists happy by floating those names.

In Washington, a confidential assistant is someone who, if you don't want to know something, you go and ask him and he won't tell you.

Bush had expertise in one thing: How to run a Presidential campaign. He understands campaigns and Presidential politics. He has no interest or disposition or I think probably - he's not stupid, but he's not bright, he's not a rocket scientist - he isn't interested in policy.

Lee Atwater,[Ronald] Reagan's strategist, had no patience for CPAC, because he thought they were sort of wild and immature, basically.

Like the battleships of old, omnibus programs present too tempting a target, too easily destroyed by a single attack, to make it through a fight.... It is through incremental change after change, step after step, that a statesman of today can vindicate a bold vision.

Ronald Reagan cut taxes to raise the deficit to stop liberals in future years from increasing spending. Obama will raise spending to raise the deficit to stop conservatives in future years from cutting taxes. As he funds every liberal dream - from alternative energy production to infrastructure renovation to more federal revenue sharing - he will force a massive expansion in the size of government for a decade to come.

A party is a political tool. If it's no longer useful, it should be crumpled up and thrown away.

It has been sagaciously conjectured, that the artful legislator indulged the stubborn prejudices of his countrymen.

Politics is not a science, as the professors are apt to suppose. It is an art.

It really doesn't take brains to be a politician as much as it takes stomach. Both would be nice, but in America we have accepted diminishing returns in this arena.

The golden rule has no place in a political campaign.

Politics are a smooth file, which cuts gradually, and attains its end by slow progression.

Some are arguing that the Democrats should resist at every turn [to Donald's Trump administration], and some Democrats are saying that's the strategy that Democrats should now employ.

Never give a good politician time to pray.

The only people I know getting in high places by running their mouth are politicians.

The first rule in politics is that there are no rules, at least not in the sense of inevitable defeats or inevitable victories. If you have the right policy and the right strategy, you always have a chance of winning. Without them, you can lose no matter how certain the victory seems.

It was the custom when men received nominations to come to me for contributions, and I made them and considered them good paying investments for the company. In a Republican district I was a strong Republican; in a Democratic district I was Democratic, and in doubtful districts I was doubtful. In politics I was an Erie Railroad man all the time.

I have observed in my 30 years in Washington that when a President initiates a major policy speech on a controversial issue while Congress is in recess, it usually is because what he is advocating is indefensible and that he is seeking to minimize criticism.