George Will quotes - page 3

It is said that God gave us memory so we could have roses in winter. But it is also true that without memory we could not have self in any season. The more memories you have, the more you have. That is why, as Swift said, ''No wise man ever wished to be younger.'' (George Will)
The Berlin Wall is the defining achievement of socialism. View quote
George Will
Money is time made tangible - the time invested in the earning of it. Taxation is the confiscation of the earner's time. Although some taxation is necessary, all taxation diminishes freedom. View quote
George Will
Corporations do not pay taxes, they collect them, passing the burden to consumers as a cost of production. And corporate taxation is a feast of rent-seeking - a cornucopia of credits, exemptions and other subsidies conferred by the political class on favored, and grateful, corporations. View quote
George Will
Voters cannot hold officials responsible if they do not know what government is doing, or which parts of government are doing what. View quote
George Will
All politicians are to some extent salesmen. View quote
George Will
Big government inevitably drives an upward distribution of wealth to those whose wealth, confidence and sophistication enable them to manipulate government. View quote
George Will
It is no longer enough to be lusty. One must be a sexual gourmet. View quote
George Will
All politics takes place on a slippery slope. The most important four words in politics are up to a point. View quote
George Will
Politics in a democracy is transactional: Politicians seek votes by promising to do things for voters, who seek promises in exchange for their votes. View quote
George Will
Freedom means the freedom to behave coarsely, basely, foolishly. (George Will)
The strongest continuous thread in America's political tradition is skepticism about government. View quote
George Will
Modern Americans travel light, with little philosophic baggage other than a fervent belief in their right to the pursuit of happiness. View quote
George Will
Constitutional arguments that seem as dry as dust can have momentous consequences. View quote
George Will
Obama, startled that components of government behave as interest groups, seems utterly unfamiliar with public choice theory. It demystifies and de-romanticizes politics by applying economic analysis - how incentives influence behavior - to government. View quote
George Will
Popularity makes no law invulnerable to invalidation. Americans accept judicial supervision of their democracy - judicial review of popular but possibly unconstitutional statutes - because they know that if the Constitution is truly to constitute the nation, it must trump some majority preferences. View quote
George Will
The average American expends more time becoming informed about choosing a car than choosing a candidate. But, then, the consequences of the former choice are immediate and discernible. View quote
George Will
Actually, there is only one ''first question'' of government, and it is ''How should we live'' or ''What kind of people do we want our citizens to be'' View quote
George Will
Modern man's capacity for destruction is quixotic evidence of humanity's capacity for reconstruction. The powerful technological agents we have unleashed against the environment include many of the agents we require for its reconstruction. View quote
George Will
The unpleasant sound Bush is emitting as he traipses from one conservative gathering to another is a thin, tinny arf - the sound of a lap dog. View quote
George Will
America is the only developed nation that has a 2,000-mile border with a developing nation, and the government's refusal to control that border is why there are an estimated 460,000 illegal immigrants in Arizona and why the nation, sensibly insisting on first things first, resists 'comprehensive' immigration reform. (George Will)
Arizonans should not be judged disdainfully and from a distance by people whose closest contacts with Hispanics are with fine men and women who trim their lawns and put plates in front of them at restaurants, not with illegal immigrants passing through their backyards at 3 A.M. View quote
George Will
Democrats believe, plausibly, that middle-class entitlements are instantly addictive and, because there is no known detoxification, that class, when facing future choices between trimming entitlements or increasing taxes, will choose the latter. View quote
George Will
If those who wrote and ratified the 14th Amendment had imagined laws restricting immigration - and had anticipated huge waves of illegal immigration - is it reasonable to presume they would have wanted to provide the reward of citizenship to the children of the violators of those laws? Surely not. View quote
George Will
The 1935 Social Security Act established 65 as the age of eligibility for payouts. But welfare state politics quickly becomes a bidding war, enriching the menu of benefits, so in 1956 Congress entitled women to collect benefits at 62, extending the entitlement to men in 1961. View quote
George Will