Mikhail Gorbachev

I think the environmental problem will be the number one item on the agenda of the 21st century… This is a problem that cannot be postponed.

I think God has some mechanism that he uses to punish those that make mistakes.

Imagine a country that flies into space, launches Sputniks, creates such a defense system, and it can’t resolve the problem of women’s pantyhose. There’s no toothpaste, no soap powder, not the basic necessities of life. It was incredible and humiliating to work in such a government.

I think we need more young people; we need to elect young people to government. We need to give them a chance, in the media, in politics, in democracy.

I don’t think Russia is setting this as a goal; I don’t think this should be Russia’s goal. I think even the United States doesn’t need to be a superpower. China doesn’t need to be a superpower. It’s a different world.

More socialism means more democracy, openness and collectivism in everyday life.

The option preferred by the privileged is for the fate of everyone else to be in the hands of insurance company executives whose goal, as Milton Friedman can explain, is to ensure maximum profit and market share: meaning the worst possible health care.

Overall, we are moving in the right direction. We have started on the trajectory toward robust economic growth in Russia. Yes, this growth is humble, small, but it is also not a fall. Growth was at 1.5 percent last year.

Anyone can be a moral individual, concerned with human rights and problems; but only a college professor, a trained expert, can solve technical problems by ‘sophisticated’ methods. Ergo, it is only problems of the latter sort that are important or real.

Economic activity is moving from the Atlantic ocean to the Pacific ocean… Russia has a certain natural advantage because it also borders the Pacific Ocean.

I believe that the presidential term should be limited.

For many years, I have been writing and speaking about the danger of the rise of an honest and charismatic ideologue in the United States, someone who could exploit the fear and anger that has long been boiling in much of the society, and who could direct it away from the actual agents of malaise to vulnerable targets. That could indeed lead to what sociologist Bertram Gross called ‘friendly fascism’ in a perceptive study 35 years ago..

Kim Jong Un just stated that the Nuclear Button is on his desk at all times.Will someone from his depleted and food starved regime please inform him that I too have a Nuclear Button, but it is a much bigger and more powerful one than his, and my Button works!

I was in Moscow recently and I spoke, indirectly and directly, with President Putin, who could not have been nicer, and we had a tremendous success.

Not only were [the British] able to break into China for the first time, but also the profits from opium supported the Raj, the costs of the British Navy, and provided very significant capital which fueled the industrial revolution in England.

The most repressive countries in the Middle East are the ones we support. By comparison to Saudi Arabia, Iran looks like Norway…As far as violence in the Middle East is concerned, the Saudi Arabian [and] UAE actions in Yemen, which we’re supporting, are much worse than anything.

[Overseas] we build a school, we build a road, they blow up the school, we build another school, we build another road, they blow them up, we build again. In the meantime we can’t get a f**king school in Brooklyn.

The Eurasian union is a project meant to preserve the identities of nations and the historic Eurasian community in the new century, in a new world.

I have always loved and avidly read the novels of Jack London, Jules Verne and Ernest Hemingway. The characters depicted in their books, who are brave and resourceful people embarking on exciting adventures, definitely shaped my inner self and nourished my love for the outdoors.

It is extremely dangerous to encourage people to see themselves as [inherently] exceptional, whatever the motivation. There are big countries and small countries, rich and poor, those with long democratic traditions and those still finding their way to democracy. Their policies differ, too. We are all different, but when we ask for the Lord’s blessings, we must not forget that God created us equal.

The most effective device [of thought control developed in democratic societies] is the bounding of the thinkable, achieved by tolerating debate, even encouraging it, though only within proper limits.