A Quote by William Blum

Our leaders are cruel because only those willing to be inordinately cruel and remorseless can hold positions of leadership in the foreign policy establishment. People capable of expressing a full human measure of compassion and empathy toward faraway powerless strangers do not become president of the United States, or vice president, or secretary of state, or national security adviser or secretary of the treasury. Nor do they want to.

William Blum

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Quote Author

William Blum
American - Author
Born: March 6, 1933

Constitutionally, gentlemen, you have the president, the vice president and the secretary of state, in that order, and should the president decide he wants to transfer the helm to the vice president, he will do so. As for now, I'm in control here, in the White House.

Alexander Haig

We only have one president and one secretary of state, but our founding fathers very clearly insisted that Congress play a significant role in foreign policy.

Tom Cotton

Bill Clinton, who, to his credit, has established a clear and consistent foreign policy, which is as follows: Whenever the president of the United States gets anywhere near any foreign head of state, living or dead, he gives that leader a big old hug. This has proven to be an effective way to get foreign leaders to do what we want: Many heads of state are willing to sign any random document that President Clinton thrusts in front of them, without reading it, just so he will stop embracing them.

Dave Barry

I think my father thought I might be president of the United States. I think he would've been satisfied with secretary of state. I'm a foreign policy person and to have a chance to serve my country as the nation's chief diplomat at a time of peril and consequence, that was enough.

Condoleezza Rice

I think my father thought I might be president of the United States. I think he would've been satisfied with secretary of state. I'm a foreign policy person, and to have a chance to serve my country as the nation's chief diplomat at a time of peril and consequence, that was enough.

Condoleezza Rice

Ms. Rice was a bad national security adviser and a bad secretary of state. She was on the wrong side of some of the administration's biggest internal policy fights. She had a tendency to flip-flop when it came to the president's core priorities, and her political misjudgment more than once cost Mr. Bush dearly.

Bret Stephens

Secretary of state is far superior to vice president, because it's involved in continuously solving problems and making policy and not being on standby.

Gloria Steinem

I would say it's more important who the treasury secretary is than who the vice president is. If you want to have a debate here, I'd like a debate between potential treasury secretaries than the vice presidential debate.

Warren Buffett

I spent several years in a North Vietnamese prison camp in the dark, fed with scraps. Do you think I want to do that all over again as vice president of the United States? The vice president has two duties. One is to break a tie in case of a tie vote in the United States Senate... The other is to inquire daily as to the health of the president. Neither one of those are very challenging as compared to being able to live for a good part of the time in the state of Arizona.

John McCain

I was not only the first woman to become secretary of state, I was the first [U.S.] secretary of state of the 21st century. I was the first secretary of state to own a Web site, to visit Internet cafes, and to make Internet access a part of policy.

Madeleine Albright

The Secretary of Hygiene or Physical Culture will be far more important in the cabinet of the President of the United States who holds office in the year 2035 than the Secretary of War.

Nikola Tesla

Foreign policy always has more force and punch when the nation speaks with one voice. To remain secure, prosperous, and free, the United States must continue to lead. That leadership requires a president and Congress working together to fashion a foreign policy with broad, bipartisan support. A foreign policy of unity is essential if the United States is to promote its values and interests effectively and help to build a safer, freer, and more prosperous world.

Lee H. Hamilton

I think what we need to do is understand our number one obligation is to act in the national interest of the United States of America. I believe it is in our national interest to see democracy take hold on the island of Cuba. And so we examine our foreign policy, including all the changes that President Obama made, in that lens and through that lens.

Marco Rubio

We enriched foreign countries at the expense of our own country, the great United States of America. But those days are over. I'm not - and I don't want to be - the president of the world. I'm the president of the United States. And from now on, it's going to be America First.

Donald Trump

My last visit to China as secretary, January of 2011, I told President Hu Jintao, just like this, "President of the United States wanted me to tell you that we now consider North Korea a direct threat to the United States." And it had no effect whatsoever.

Robert M. Gates

The President doesn't just appoint the Secretary of State, he appoints the Secretary of State, and then the Congress votes. And if the Congress approves that person, that person becomes Secretary of State.

Josh Marshall

A Quote by William Blum

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