Richard Armitage Quotes

The Americans' position is clear: we promote democracy.

No idea holds greater sway in the minds of educated Americans that the belief that it is possible to democratize governments anytime and anywhere under any circumstances .

We cannot impose democracy where it has no constituency.

If my goal were to spread democracy, Iraq would be the last country that I would use as a demonstration.

America's objective today should be to try to make herself the best possible mirror of democracy that she can. The people of the world can see what happens here. They watch us to see what we are going to do and how well we can do it. We are giving them the only possible picture of democracy that we can: the picture as it works in actual practice. This is the only way other peoples can see for themselves how it works; and can determine for themselves whether this thing is good in itself, whether it is better than they have, better than what other political and economic systems offer them.

While American interests in the Middle East must obviously be protected, America's credibility to support democracy for everyone everywhere is crucial.

Democracy is the common pursuit of mankind, and all countries must earnestly protect the democratic rights of the people.

Russia does not and cannot have any political choice but democracy. I want to say, and even stress, that we share those universal democratic principles taken around the whole world.

We must take proactive steps to promote democracy and human rights abroad.

America's support for human rights and democracy is our noblest export to the world.

What the U.S. should do consistently is to support the liberty of the Egyptian people.

In the end, it's a good investment for America to be involved in helping people get democratic governance - not to take over their country - but to help people be free. And that is an investment that will pay off in the future.

The test of democracy is freedom of criticism.

Democracy is on trial in the world, on a more colossal scale than ever before.

American interests dictate that we teach other peoples to govern themselves.

It seems strange to the rest of the world, but we Americans can't seem to stop talking about how other countries should be democratic like we are.

Democracy must learn to defend itself.

Taiwan is a budding democracy, and the people have participated in multi-party democratic elections since 1996.

By helping readers understand these mechanics, I hope they will appreciate why freedom is for everyone, why it is essential for our security and why the free world plays a critically important role in advancing democracy around the globe.

We must never forget that many around the globe are denied the basic rights we enjoy as Americans. If we are to continue enjoying these privileges and freedoms we must accept our mission of expanding democracy around the globe.

I regard freedom of expression as the primary right without which one can not have a proper functioning democracy.

It is an essential tenet of our whole representative form of government, the idea that there should not be some tyranny which makes it so nobody can even have a chance to vote.

The history of our country is not the history of any other country in the world which is either practicing advanced democracy or struggling to lay the foundation for democracy.

Democracy still has a real hope and chance in Iraq, and true freedom in this country would be the greatest testament to those who gave their lives for it.

The Declaration calls us to recognize the inherent equality of all people. And when it becomes unmistakably evident that a government is denying the governed life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, it's the right of people to establish a new government to secure these unalienable rights.