Vladimir Putin

Politics should not interfere with sports. And sports should impact politics.

The philosophy of FIFA is to expand world soccer space, to spread out the world football space.

Russia is opposed to the proliferation of mass destruction weapons, including nuclear weapons, and in this context we call upon our Iranian friends to abandon the uranium enrichment programme.

The United States has overstepped its borders in all spheres – economic, political and humanitarian – and has imposed itself on other states.

I think the American people should express their preferences, and we’ll accept their choice.

Some experts believe that somebody is deceiving WikiLeaks, that its reputation is being undermined in order for it to be used for political purposes.

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.

Take a look at the British conquest of Ireland, the earliest of the Western colonial conquests. It was described in the same terms as the conquest of Africa. The Irish were a different race. They weren’t human. They weren’t like us. We had to crush and destroy them.

The problem is not the occupation, but how people deal with it.

On economic policy, in particular, the striking thing about the leadership contest was that every candidate other than Mr. Corbyn essentially supported the Conservative government’s austerity policies. … The Corbyn upset isn’t about a sudden left turn on the part of Labour supporters. It’s mainly about the strange, sad moral and intellectual collapse of Labour moderates.

The social system is taking on a form in which finding out what you want to do is less and less of an option because your life is too structured, organised, controlled and disciplined.

Based on our preliminary calculations, we may in the next six years spend 17 trillion roubles (Putin said billion, but meant trillion), but to achieve the goals that we have discussed, we will need an additional 8 trillion roubles. And it is clear where we are going to find them.

Politics in the true sense, have to do with the prosperity, peace and security of the people.

Concentration of wealth yields concentration of political power. And concentration of political power gives rise to legislation that increases and accelerates the cycle.

I know that after my death a pile of rubbish will be heaped on my grave, but the wind of History will sooner or later sweep it away without mercy.

We [U.S.S.R. and U.S.A.] can exist peacefully together if we don’t indulge in too much mutual fault-finding in all kinds of trifles.

Real liberty exists only there where exploitation has been annihilated, where no oppression of some peoples by others exists, where there is no unemployment and pauperism, where a person does not tremble because tomorrow he may lose his job, home and bread.

Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives. I think we’re being run by maniacs for maniacal ends and I think I’m liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That’s what’s insane about it.

Did you suffer? Terribly. In fact, it tore my life apart. Up until that time I didn’t really understand the transformation that was going on in Russia. When I had come home from the GDR, it was clear to me that something was happening. But during the days of the coup, all the ideals, all the goals that I had had when I went to work for the

One fundamental goal of any well-crafted indoctrination program is to direct attention elsewhere, away from effective power, its roots, and the disguises it assumes.

[on his SNL performance wearing a MAGA hat] They bullied me backstage. They said don’t go out there with that hat on. They bullied me backstage. They bullied me.