Mark Plotkin Quotes

Thank you, Mr. President, for hosting us and giving me the chance to be with so many people I haven’t voted for.

When you turn 18 in the United States, you should be automatically registered to vote. Ideally, this sensible reform would be a federal law affecting all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and American territories, but our federal government stopped being sensible a very long time ago.

Statehood for the District of Columbia is the most important civil rights and social justice issue in America today.

I have not met, in Afghanistan, in even the most remote community, anybody who does not want a say in who governs them. Most remote community, I have never met a villager who does not want a vote.

We are at a point where democracy—the idea and practice of people controlling their lives—is a revolutionary issue in the United States.

In the United States, politics is a profession, whereas in Europe it is a right and a duty.

We pride ourselves on our democracy, but when you see the way it actually works, I think it is worthy of contempt.

We tie ourselves in knots when we act as if democracy is good for the United States and Israel but not for the Arab world. For far too long, we've treated the Arab world as just an oil field.

America must begin the struggle for democracy at home. The advocacy of free elections in Europe by American officials is hypocrisy when free elections are not held in great sections of America.

I've always tried to explain democracy is not perfect. But it gives you a chance to shape your own destiny.

I do think that we are facing a crisis in our democracy. As true patriots, each and every one of us has to speak up, speak out, and change those in charge. Our democracy depends upon it.

Once I should have been, if not satisfied, partially, at least, contented with suffrage for the intelligent and those who have been soldiers; now I am convinced that universal suffrage is demanded by sound policy and impartial justice.

At its most basic the democratic contract is a simple one: the right to vote comes with a responsibility to society, through tax payments and citizenship.

We should not be surprised that democracy is imperfect even in Western countries.

All I wanted was for the public to be able to have a say in how they are governed. That is a milestone we left a long time ago.

Among many other reforms, Australians pioneered the secret ballot and universal suffrage.

Ballots are the rightful and peaceful successors to bullets.

Do not seek to find a reason why elections are not possible. Seek to make them possible, and they will be possible.

Whenever anybody gets involved in politics, its always exciting for me because we take for granted our freedoms and our abilities to effect change through political activism.

If we, as individuals, want to keep control of our democracy - rather than have a government paid for by corporate interest checks - then we have to fight back now and make sure our system reflects the belief that people, not corporations, control our democracy.

I kinda halfway paid attention to politics during my early years, but the older you get, the more you realize it's very important to pay attention to who gets elected. They can ruin the country.

And in Canada we, you know, it costs us three or $400 million to have an election. You know, it's always been my position that we shouldn't complain about that; that's the price of admission for a living in a great democracy.

When push comes to shove, people vote alone.

I came into American politics and into this political system proud of politics and the way we make decisions.

Our democracy, our constitutional framework is really a kind of software for harnessing the creativity and political imagination for all of our people. The American democratic system was an early political version of Napster.