John McCain

Demographics aren’t destiny. Our culture isn’t the work of one race or religion. To suggest otherwise is to contradict our ideals and to doubt their power.

Every day, people serve their neighbors and our nation in many different ways, from helping a child learn and easing the loneliness of those without a family to defending our freedom overseas. It is in this spirit of dedication to others and to our country that I believe service should be broadly and deeply encouraged.

Most great leaders in history that I’ve studied always need to get as wide a range of opinions as possible so that they can have sufficient information to make the right decisions.

We have to fight. We have to fight against propaganda and crackpot conspiracy theories. We have to fight isolationism, protectionism, and nativism. We have to defeat those who would worsen our divisions. We have to remind our sons and daughters that we became the most powerful nation on Earth by tearing down walls, not building them.

In prison, I fell in love with my country. I had loved her before then, but like most young people, my affection was little more than a simple appreciation for the comforts and privileges most Americans enjoyed and took for granted. It wasn’t until I had lost America for a time that I realized how much I loved her.

America didn’t invent human rights. Those rights are common to all people: nations, cultures, and religions cannot choose to simply opt out of them.

We allow our ignorance to prevail upon us and make us think we can survive alone, alone in patches, alone in groups, alone in races, even alone in genders.

You will have bad times, but they will always wake you up to the stuff you weren’t paying attention to.

A few strong instincts and a few plain rules suffice us.

There is as much difference between the counsel that a friend giveth, and that a man giveth himself, as there is between the counsel of a friend and of a flatterer. For there is no such flatterer as is a man’s self.

Eastward I go only by force; but westward I go free.

Every burned book enlightens the world.

We are wiser than we know.

Human beings must have action; and they will make it if they cannot find it.

And Barack and I were raised with so many of the same values, like you work hard for what you want in life. That your word is your bond; that you do what you say you’re going to do. That you treat people with dignity and respect, even if you don’t know them and even if you don’t agree with them.

Have a care, therefore, where there is more sail than ballast.

When you ascend the hill of prosperity, may you not meet a friend.

One thing only I know, and that is that I know nothing.

At the end of the day, life is about being happy being who you are.

Nothing is pleasant that is not spiced with variety.

Only an inventor knows how to borrow, and every man is or should be an inventor.