Top 101 Quotes & Sayings by Gavin Esler - Page 2

A Jethro Tull album was - along with Cream and Led Zeppelin - one of the first I ever bought.

I cry at births and not at funerals.

Compromise disappoints those who buy into the most ambitious and simplistic populist slogans.

From Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos to Google and Facebook, many of America's greatest entrepreneurs, musicians, movie directors and novelists are world beaters.

I spent the first three years of my life with my parents, grandmother and two aunties in a tiny council house in Glasgow.

Receiving my first degree was one of the most important days of my life.

My father was a member of the Dunkirk Veterans Association.

As a journalist, I have spent years reporting on often difficult and depressing conflicts, on poverty, and the inhuman way we sometimes treat each other.

Privacy is dead. We live in a world of instantaneous, globalised gossip. The idea that there is a 'private' sphere and a 'public' sphere for world leaders, politicians or anyone in the public eye is slowly disintegrating. The death of privacy will have a profound effect on who our leaders will be in the future.

There is so much unreliable information on the internet and in the media.

There are people who appear on television who are paid for by shadowy think tanks whose financing they won't come clean about.

Funerals should celebrate a life.

If someone appears on television and makes a comment, and we quote that comment, we are being accurate. But are we actually being sensible if we don't know if that comment is based on any facts whatsoever? It is something that journalists have to be much more aware of.

London thrives because it is one of the most open cities in the world, but Brexit is shutting the door on talented people coming to live and work here - the people we need when we get sick, the ones we see on the Tube, our friends and neighbours. Even worse, it has made London a less tolerant place.

Amateurism has its place in government, in journalism and also on the tennis court, but lack of expertise means politicians routinely promise far more than they achieve.

I've never learned to speak a foreign language with ease.

In years of interviewing presidents, prime ministers and chief executives all over the world, I can remember only a handful of times in which a leader has said: 'I don't know' in answer to a question. Perhaps everyone I have ever interviewed knows everything about everything, but I doubt it.

Populism, literally, means speaking for 'the people.' In practice it means demagoguery.

I mostly like politicians. Very few of them are evil, although quite a lot are delusional.

The country I live in is never clear about its name. My passport says 'the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland,' and citizens of the U.K. may call themselves British, English, Scottish, Welsh or from Northern Ireland.

As journalists we are sceptical by nature, but there are some things you take on trust.

I never have met any heroes - except one. The exception is Ian Anderson, flute player extraordinaire, creative musical talent for more than 40 years, and the man most associated with the band Jethro Tull.

During my childhood in the Cold War, my family saw America as a great ally in our common struggle to keep back Soviet communism.

Life is about relationships, not transactions.

Leaders of organisations, political parties and large businesses frequently fail to talk in a straight and entirely truthful fashion.

As a teenager in Scotland, I had American friends, sons and daughters of officers at a U.S. Air Force base.

World leaders and major political figures have often had delusions of grandeur.

Democratic government is difficult. It is much more difficult than populists claim. It's not like running a business or a police force. It demands compromise.

A political and economic system that only works for a small group at the top is a system that needs to change.

We need to create a sense of shame about racism, and about leaders who deliberately mislead and lie.

Government is not a game show, though at times it is amusing and entertaining to watch.

One of my American heroes is the great former U.S. diplomat George Kennan.

Nobody is infallible, but it is important to have trusted guides when it comes to information.

This is the only life I'm ever going to have, so shouldn't I at least try to be happy?

In difficult times, most of us need friends.

Donald Trump's tweets attract ridicule from some. But clearly they communicate effectively with his millions of supporters.

The U.S. has always been an indispensable ally.

International politics attracts politicians who talk a good game, but whose achievements are often slender.

I've always been a fan of the Overton Window. It's not a piece of glass but a political theory named after the conservative American political analyst, Joseph P Overton.

When I visit universities in the U.A.E., the U.S. and across Europe, I see the faces of the leaders of tomorrow.

The hand that wields the knife shall never wear the crown.