Angus King Quotes

Just because there is a problem doesn't mean that we have to solve it, if the cure is going to be more expensive than the original ailment.

All policy is a matter of gains and losses, upsides and downsides.

I don't have a particular recommendation other than that we base decisions on as much hard data as possible. We need to carefully look at all the options and all their ramifications in making our decisions.

When a government faces an evil that might be avoided, the usual pattern is to first debate whether or not the evil is real or imagined; then determine how evil it really is; then is it an appropriate function of government to avoid it? Then what are the alternative ways to avoid it? Then what are the costs to avoid it? And finally, is the benefit of avoiding the evil worth the cost? In those cases where it is, it is by this time too late to avoid the evil and discussions shift to ameliorating the evil.

You try to make the decisions that you think are best in realtime.

By using your intelligence, you can sometimes make your problems twice as complicated.

A lot of people in their mind think ‘If there is a problem this is what I would do, this is how I would do it.’ But the truth is they don’t really know. Parkour teaches you to be sure of what you are able to do.

If you think of people as making decisions actively, every time we think about the cup of coffee, we say, "How much will I enjoy the cup of coffee, what else could I not do in the future because I buy this cup of coffee?

There's a host of difficult issues here, and that's why when you mentioned at the top of the show that the committees were looking at this, that's where I think we should be going.

The basic question that the 'new science' raises for our balance sheet is the issue of what scientific questions have not been asked for 500 years, which scientific risks have not been pursued. It raises the question of who has decided what scientific risks were worth taking, and what have been the consequences in terms of the power structures of the world.

Suppose you had a small electrical fire and... a structural engineer [looked] at your home's wiring [and] reports that the wiring is "shot" and there is a 50% chance that your house would burn down in the next few years unless you replace all the wiring. The job will cost $20,000... so you get an independent assessment. The next engineer agrees with the first warning. You can either continue to shop for additional evaluations until you find the one engineer in 1,000 that is willing to give you the answer you want, "Your family is not in danger" or you can change the wiring.

There is no silver bullet. There are always options and the options have consequences.

Whenever I think about an issue, I always argue the opposite side of it. So, when I ultimately decide on a course of action, I've already been through all the conceivable scenarios, and I'm going to go for it.

Daddy always said that an option that you know to have a bad outcome is only a fool's option, i.e., not an option at all. And I liked to think that Daddy hadn't raised a fool.

Normally when people say they haven't decided, they're being polite but they're definitely not voting for you. I think it's different this time. People are thinking hard about the issues.

We don't want to make a mistake. Would you rather make the mistake and err on the side of caution or wait until something happens and then answer to the American people, why you didn't vet these people properly?

The only people who have quick answers don't have the responsibility of making the decisions.

I always say to people when I'm trying to get something going, bringing on other producers or other directors, "You can think of 95 reasons why not to make a movie. You've got to address why you want to make the movie and get it done. Just do it." I tend to live by that rule.

There are some issues where ministers should come and talk to the prime minister, if the prime minister hasn't already talked to them. Any issue which a minister thinks is going to be profoundly controversial, where we do not have a clear existing position, it is important that there be a conversation between the minister and the prime minister. I think they all understand that and I think it is working very well.

Almost everything I do when I approach an operational problem comes from the time I've been in space. It's a way of organizing your thoughts. We use problem-solving; what we call "what-if-ing." What if this happened? What would we do? We go over plan B, C, D, E, F, and whatever else, depending on the criticality of what we're doing. This kind of thing can be applied almost everywhere, even at home.

Some people seem to think there's no trouble just because it hasn't happened yet. If you jump out the window at the 42nd floor and you're still doing fine as you pass the 27th floor, that doesn't mean you don't have a serious problem. I would want to address the problem right now.

I think that a lot of times, I trust people I shouldn't, and it turns out right, and it makes me feel a little better about it.

I think we have to choose, what are the issues that really matter? We have to trust that.

Politicians often like to suggest that their policies come about through objective thinking, but if you look at British fascists, for example, what you see - what I see - is a group of people coming to the decisions they came to because something happened to them when they were nine-years-old, or because of some deep prejudice that formed in them subsequent to that.

With problems and issues groups face- there is an enormous disconnect between understanding and doing.