Top 52 Quotes & Sayings by Bob Barr

The Tea Party knows that continuing to delay charting a course to spending reform hurts everybody.

Nobody is denying we should investigate and do what we can to prevent gun crime in our cities and towns. But, we should not scapegoat the American gun owner for complicated, cultural problems we are just beginning to understand.

Accepting federal funding undermines state sovereignty as states become beholden to federal requirements in order to keep the money flowing.

People come up to me and tell me they support me because I never left my principles.

Firearms manufacturers usually find themselves playing defense.

History has shown that Big Government expands quickest in the immediate aftermath of a crisis - real or manufactured.

Courts have long recognized the federal government's robust power to inspect people and goods entering the country. After all, the very foundation of national sovereignty is a nation's ability to protect its borders.

The backlash against Big Government is an encouraging sign of a growing resistance to the mission creep of federal power.

Unfortunately, most gun control advocates are not really interested in rational debate, and their political games simply send Alice chasing white rabbits down holes.

For far too long the American public and business sector have kept their silence as civil liberties have been whittled away by statutory and regulatory measures.

Despite two decisions, in 2008 and 2010, by the U.S. Supreme Court unequivocally affirming that the Second Amendment to the Constitution guarantees an individual right to keep and bear arms against infringement by the government, state legislatures continue to do just that - enact laws that significantly infringe this fundamental human right.

The average American returning from a trip abroad likely - and understandably - assumes the contents of his or her electronic device does not come close to meeting the threshold of 'criminal' activity, such as would give a government agent the right to seize and peruse their iPad just because they are returning from a vacation.

When conducted with proper preparation, and in a focused and professional manner, oversight of executive branch actions can reveal serious shortcomings by government officials and help prevent recurrence; the 'Waco hearings,' conducted over a two-week period in 1995, stand as an example of such an undertaking.

The move to tax Internet sales, clothed as a 'fairness' issue, is the typical 'wolf-in-sheep's-clothing' ploy so often used by governments unwilling to cut expenditures to match revenues. It matters not whether its proponents have a 'D' or an 'R' after their name. It is a tax increase in either case.

Iran is not a make-believe country. It is a real country populated by some 75 million people - real people; including, I daresay, a majority who are philosophically and by education inclined toward the modern, secular world, and particularly American values.

People and organizations other than doctors increasingly are assuming power to decide which medications to prescribe or procedures to undertake. More and more, decisions about personal healthcare are no longer made by the treating physicians in consultation with their patients, and based on the doctors' expertise.

Organizations worried about the potential for e-voting problems have long-advocated for audit procedures by which votes cast by e-voting machines could be verified through audit trails.

MoveOn loves government. It remains enamored of government spending as fuel for its liberal agenda; and anything that threatens to close that spigot in any degree is perceived as a dire threat - worthy of Chicken-Little warnings that the sky is going to fall.

It is not just software glitches and corrupted memory cards that should be on the minds of election officials. Hackers pose another very real problem whereby an election could be tilted towards a favored candidate.

There are hundreds of fine journalists who regularly inform us of what is happening in the world around us; and innumerable commentators who provide intelligent and objective insight on public policy matters.

The 2011 riots in England, which left five dead and caused more than $300 million in property damage, were fueled by a generation of young Brits who grew up without ever hearing the word 'No.'

In a single generation, the Internet has given to virtually every person on the face of the earth the ability to communicate with fellow human beings on virtually any topic, at any time, and in every nook and cranny on the globe. This magnificent invention has done this without succumbing to government control.

Going to war against Iran - whether one calls such a move 'surgical' or 'total' - would be an extremely serious undertaking; with worldwide economic, military, diplomatic and human ramifications in both the short- and the long-term.

Taking privacy cues from the federal government is - to say the least - ironic, considering today's Orwellian level of surveillance. At virtually any given time outside of one's own home, an American citizen can reasonably assume his movements and actions are being monitored by something, by somebody, somewhere.

The world is undoubtedly a safer, freer place because Thatcher - like Reagan - refused to back down when it came to defending freedom.

For decades, parents were told by so-called parenting 'experts' that offspring would be best raised on the belief each is special and entitled to all life has to offer.

It is high time for some congressional oversight backbone.

Widespread use of online voting will create the potential for abuse that will make the problems inherent in e-voting pale in comparison.

On taking office, Obama promised the 'most transparent' administration in history; yet his record as president has been anything but transparent.

Now, national conventions are largely an excuse for companies and party leaders to throw parties for delegates to attend, to network and have a good time.

It is difficult, if not impossible, to argue that laws written in the 1970s are adequate for today's intelligence challenges.

It's not a gun control problem; it's a cultural control problem.

The seemingly omnipresent storm clouds hanging over the Constitution often make it hard to find a silver lining. Every day, the front page of The Drudge Report is littered with stories of government assaults on our civil liberties - from local government officials all the way up to the Oval Office.

The legal principle placing the burden of proof on accusers rather than the accused can be traced back to Second and Third Century Roman jurist, Julius Paulus Prudentissimus. Yet, this ancient concept, which forms the legal and moral cornerstone of the American judicial system, is quickly being undermined in the name of 'national security.'

I'm pro-life but I believe that the federal government ought to stay out of it. That's a decision that the people of each state ought to make for themselves.

Looking down the road, space exploration and the benefits it yields - in medicine and information technology - should not be overlooked.

Chicago is known for good steaks, expensive stores and beautiful architecture. Unfortunately, the Windy City also enjoys a reputation for corrupt politics, violent crime, and some of the strictest gun control laws anywhere in the country.

Presidential and vice-presidential debates are not about campaign staff or consultants, and it is high time we as a people took control and reminded them and their candidates of that important fact.

The 2011 riots in England, which left five dead and caused more than $300 million in property damage, were fueled by a generation of young Brits who grew up without ever hearing the word No.

I sense that conservatives have largely already tuned out to the coming elections, after six years of burgeoning federal spending and inaction on key issues, such as immigration. The Republican Party has become the party of the government status quo, and conservatives see no reason to reward it with their votes.

A critical component of White House Scandal Defense 101 is rallying the partisan base. This keeps approval ratings in territory where the wheels don't start falling off. The way to achieve this goal is you go negative and you don't let up. If you're always attacking your accusers, the debate becomes one of Democrat vs. Republican, rather than right vs. wrong. Anyone who questions the legality of the decision to wiretap thousands of Americans unlawfully is attacked, as either an enabler of terrorists or a bitter partisan trying to distract a president at war.

There is no legitimate use whatsoever for marijuana. This is not medicine. This is bogus witchcraft. It has no place in medicine, no place in pain relief.

The goal in Afghanistan is to find the terrorists and take them out.

The main international problem facing America is our lack of - our loss of influence in the world and our lack of an ability to define what U.S. interests really are.

I believe in the Constitution. I believe in separation of powers. I believe in the rule of law. I believe in limited government. And these are principles and policies that apparently neither the national Republican nor the national Democrat Party believes in. I believe great damage is being done to our Constitution, and I see no remedy at all, no likelihood of that changing, if we rely on the two parties to field our candidates for national office.

Far too many people have been swept into the post-9/11 system of fear that is the basis of all public policy these days.

I think what the American people are going to see down the road is significant inflationary pressure as a result of all this government printed, you know, this new money that the government is putting in.

The Constitution never even mentions political parties, let alone the Republican and Democratic parties, yet all the election laws help to protect them from competition.

The Libertarian Party is a very mainstream party. It's a mainstream philosophy. It's of returning power from Washington to parents, to schools, to businesses in their communities.

Whether it's a sitting president when I was an impeachment manager, or a Republican president who has taken liberties with adherence to the law, to me the standard is the same.

Let us not rush into a vast expansion of government power in a misguided attempt to protect freedom. In doing so, we will inevitably erode the very freedom we seek to protect.

I supported the Iraq resolution, but that was not an approval of war in Iraq and certainly was not approval for an occupation of Iraq.