American Attitude Quotes

The phenomenon of home schooling is a wonderful example of the American can-do attitude. Growing numbers of parents have become disenchanted with government-run public schools. Many parents have simply taken matters into their own hands, literally.

For Americans war is almost all of the time a nuisance, and military skill is a luxury like Mah-Jongg. But when the issue is brought home to them, war becomes as important, for the necessary period, as business or sport. And it is hard to decide which is likely to be the more ominous for the Axis -- an American decision that this is sport, or that it is business.

It's really an optimistic show. I think most of the people in this country are optimistic, too.

I'm not sure Americans are hesitant to do this again - to fight another war, because it looked to them like a courageous and terrific endeavor.

The attitude of insolent haughtiness is characteristic of the relationships Americans form with what is alien to them, with others.

I'm deeply and passionately involved in the design process. I'm a brash American, and if my name is going to be on something, I'm going to have my say.

Our concern for human rights comes to the fore when there are gross violations of human decencies. Then other countries, including China, must recognize that this affects the American attitude towards their country. But towards what precise institutions will it evolve? I think we ought to leave something to history.

There's some pretty good academic research that suggest that what Americans don't like is losing.

We have a problem with drugs? Let's declare war on drugs! We have a problem with crime? Let's declare war on crime! We have a problem with violence? Let's declare war on violence! The deeply ingrained American attitude that we can solve any problem w/enough force creates, feeds, & rewards the epidemic of violence we are currently experiencing.

One characteristic of Americans is that they have no toleration at all of anybody putting up with anything. We believe that whatever is going wrong ought to be fixed.

Americans have always had an ambivalent attitude toward intelligence. When they feel threatened, they want a lot of it, and when they don't, they regard the whole thing as somewhat immoral.

Most Americans do not like poetry. We may respect it, but we do not enjoy it.

Europe seems a little softer, but in America it's harsh. In L.A., where I live, it's all about perfectionism.

I know very few Americans, though I like the way they think. They think big.

It is impossible to exaggerate the wide, and widening, gulf between the American attitude on the Iraq war and the view from our friends across the Atlantic.

Look, we're Americans: optimistic, addicted to the quick fix, constantly on the hunt for the new and exotic. It's much easier for us to accept a guy with a big white beard hawking his own custom blend of saw palmetto and squirrel dandruff that it is to hear a real doctor telling us to lay off the big macs, and get off our fat asses and take a walk every decade or so.

Major Strasser: You give him (Rick Blaine) credit for too much cleverness. My impression was that he's just another blundering American. Captain Renault: We musn't underestimate American blundering. I was with them when they blundered into Berlin in 1918.