Olympia Snowe Quotes

So the - the part of the problem is not just the rhetoric. It's the fact that we - we're so polarized in what we've done to each other as parties over the last thirty years in redistricting that it's very, very hard to overcome your own constituencies and move to the middle.

We need less bipartisanship in Congress.

Like most Americans, I feel disgusted when we see people make decisions based on party politics rather than a solution that is best for the country.

Redistricting and a broken, polarized Congress have made it tough to be a moderate in Congress.

The most biased people are the Democrats.

I mean, the country is deeply divided. There is 35 percent of the people who are Tea Partiers or more in some of those states. So it's probably going to be a difficult year, but there's nothing that I think anyone can do about it.

The Republican and Democratic parties have accomplished an amazing feat with the red state/blue state paradigm. They've convinced everyone that regardless of how bad they are, the other guy is worse.

I think that what is truly unfortunate is when an entire party makes a decision that they're going to block every single thing that a president wants to accomplish. It's very - it's very hard to get anything done in those circumstances.

The middle in Congress is gone now. That is where we got most things done.

Newt Gingrich developed a whole vocabulary of polarization in order to get Republican candidates elected.

I've had a growing conviction that Congress is not operating as it should. There is much too much partisanship and not enough progress.

The polarization of Congress; the decline of civility; and the rise of attack politics in the 1980s, the 1990s, and the early years of the new century are a blot on our political system and a disservice to the American people.

While I have worked hard to bring folks to the middle to craft common-sense solutions to the many problems that confront our nation, Washington is mired in gridlock, gamesmanship and constant partisan bickering.

The country has sorted itself ideologically into the two political parties, and those partisan attachments have hardened in recent years. It will take an extraordinary event and act of leadership to break this partisan divide. I thought 9/11 might provide such an opportunity, but it was not seized.

Party leads to vicious, corrupt and unprofitable legislation, for the sole purpose of defeating party.

Partisanship particularly increased after the 1994 elections and then the appearance of the first unified Republican government since the 1950s.

Whenever a fellow tells me he's bipartisan, I know he's going to vote against me.

The two parties are still more polarized than ever before and the rise of partisan media is an important reason for it.

Too many politicians are shifting the critical themes of our national conversations from a 'big ideas' American Brand Platform to narrowly focused, polarizing sound bites that put party philosophy before what used to be heralded as the common good. These ideas, more often than not, divide us rather than serve to bind us.

Everywhere I go - from Main Street to Wall Street - people ask, 'What's happened to our political system? Why can't Washington folks work together?'

Obama rammed through Obamacare legislation without a single Republican vote.

Imagine Texas as a blue state: how hard it would be to carry the presidency or gain control of the Senate.

We can't allow ourselves to descend down the rabbit hole of unbridled partisanship for partisan sake.

Because of the structure of the contemporary American party system, every president is polarizing.

There is nothing I dread so much as a division of the Republic into two great political parties, each arranged under its leader and converting measures in opposition to each other.