Michelle Obama

I want someone with the proven strength to persevere, someone who knows this job and takes it seriously, someone who understands that the issues a president faces are not black and white and cannot be boiled down to 140 characters.

I’ve been at so many tables with so many folks who are imposters. But shame on us if we sit by and let an imposter talk us down.

I have had to learn that my voice has value. And if I don’t use it, what’s the point of being in the room?

Empower yourselves with a good education, then get out there and use that education to build a country worthy of your boundless promise.

You cannot take your freedoms for granted. Just like generations who have come before you, you have to do your part to preserve and protect those freedoms… you need to be preparing yourself to add your voice to our national conversation.

When you’ve worked hard, and done well, and walked through that doorway of opportunity, you do not slam it shut behind you. You reach back, and you give other folks the same chances that helped you succeed.

In the modern world, those who are weak will get unambiguous advice from foreign visitors which way to go and what policy course to pursue.

Powerful states have quite typically considered themselves to be exceptionally magnificent and the United States is no exception to that. The basis for it is not very substantial, to put it politely.

Indeed, Russia and the U.S. were allies during the two tragic conflicts of the Second and the First World Wars, which allows us to think there’s something objectively bringing us together in difficult times, and I think – I believe – it has to do with geopolitical interests and also has a moral component.

The production of souls is more important than the production of tanks…. And therefore I raise my glass to you, writers, the engineers of the human soul.

When people grow more alienated and isolated, they begin to develop highly irrational and very self-destructive attitudes. They want something in their lives…[t]hey don’t want to be just glued to the TV set. If most of the constructive ways are cut off, they turn to other ways.

Iraq is a small but very proud nation.

I think George W. Bush has a warm, engaging personality. But, you know, the presidency is more than just a popularity contest.

We Marxists believe that revolution will occur in other countries, as well. But it will occur at a time when it will be considered possible or necessary by revolutionaries of those countries.

We are no longer a leader. Putin has become the leader, and it’s an embarassment to our country.

Firstly, the use of our armed forces in the battlefield is a unique experience, a unique tool by which to improve our armed forces. No amount of military exercise could compare with the use of force in combat conditions.

Don’t automatically obey Presidential directives if you disagree or if you suspect he hasn’t considered key aspects of the issue.

In fact, in my view, if the managers of the propaganda system were more intelligent, they would allow more leeway to real dissidents and critics. Because it still wouldn’t make much of a difference, given the overwhelming weight of propaganda on the other side…

It’s very important for institutions of concentrated power to keep people alone and isolated: that way they’re ineffective, they can’t defend themselves against indoctrination, they can’t even figure out what they think.

In the US, first of all, the electoral system has been almost totally shredded. For a long time it’s been pretty much run by private concentrated spending but now it’s over the top. Elections increasingly over the years have been [public relations] extravaganzas.

The “We are America, bitch” posture appeals to chauvinistic instincts and the white supremacy that is a deeply rooted feature of American culture and is now exacerbated by concern that whites might even become a minority.I don’t incidentally suggest that the [media] deceit is conscious. Much more likely, it’s just the enormous power of conformity to convention, to what Gramsci called hegemonic “common sense.” Some ideas are not even rejected; they are unthinkable.