Bill Clinton Quotes

Bill Clinton delivers bold, political commentary on leadership, America and the future that feels like a spirited debate.

69 quotes

1. He won't take the lead in protecting the environment and creating new jobs in environmental technologies for the 21st century, but I will. And you know what else? He doesn't have Al Gore, and I do.

2. It is time to heal America. And so we must say to every American: Look beyond the stereotypes that blind us. We need each other. All of us-we need each other. We don't have a person to waste. And yet for too long politicians have told the most of us that are doing all right that what's really wrong with America is the rest of us. Them. Them, the minorities. Them, the liberals. Them, the poor. Them, the homeless. Them, the people with disabilities. Them, the gays. We've gotten to where we've nearly themed ourselves to death. Them and them and them. But this is America. There is no them; there's only us.

3. End welfare as we know it.

4. When I was in England I experimented with marijuana a time or two-and didn't like it-and didn't inhale and never tried inhaling again.

5. There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America.

6. Posterity is the world to come; the world for whom we hold our ideals, from whom we have borrowed our planet, and to whom we bear sacred responsibility. We must do what America does best: offer more opportunity to all and demand responsibility from all.

7. You know, we can't be so fixated on our desire to preserve the rights of ordinary Americans to legitimately own handguns and rifles-it's something I strongly support-we can't be so fixated on that that we are unable to think about the reality of life that millions of Americans face on streets that are unsafe, under conditions that no other nation-no other nations-has permitted to exist. And at some point, I still hope that the leadership of the National Rifle Association will go back to doing what it did when I was a boy and which made me want to be a lifetime member because they put out valuable information about hunting and marksmanship and safe use of guns. But just to know of the conditions we face today in a lot of our cities and other places in this country and the enormous threat to public safety is amazing.

8. Let me tell you something-wait a minute. You know one thing that's wrong with this country? Everybody gets a chance to have their fair say-my budget did more to fight AIDS than any in history, and we're having to put up with this. Tell them to let me talk. If you want to give a speech-go out there and raise your own crowd. We'll be glad to listen to you. So there were those-I'll make you a deal. I'll ignore them if you will.

9. African-Americans watch the same news at night that ordinary Americans do.

10. Shalom haver. Goodbye friend.

11. Our rich texture of racial, religious and political diversity will be a Godsend in the 21st century. Great rewards will come to those who can live together, learn together, work together, forge new ties that bind together.

12. Abigail, do you favor the U.S. Army abolishing the affirmative action program that produced Colin Powell? Yes or no? Yes or no?

13. I want to say one thing to the American people. I want you to listen to me. I'm gonna say this again. I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinski. I never told anybody to lie, not a single time, never. These allegations are false, and I need to go back to work for the American people.

14. Next, we must help parents protect their children from the gravest health threat that they face -- an epidemic of teen smoking, spread by multimillion dollar marketing campaigns. I challenge Congress -- let's pass bipartisan, comprehensive legislation that will improve public health, protect our tobacco farmers and change the way tobacco companies do business forever. Let's do what it takes to bring teen smoking down. Let's raise the price of cigarettes by up to $1.50 a pack over the next 10 years with penalties on the tobacco industry if it keeps marketing to our children.

15. No one wants to get this matter behind us more than I do-except maybe all the rest of the American people.

16. It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is. If the-if he-if 'is' means is and never has been, that is not-that is one thing. If it means there is none, that was a completely true statement. : Now, if someone had asked me on that day, are you having any kind of sexual relations with Ms. Lewinsky, that is, asked me a question in the present tense, I would have said no. And it would have been completely true.

17. Indeed, I did have a relationship with Miss Lewinsky that was not appropriate. In fact, it was wrong. It constituted a critical lapse in judgment and a personal failure on my part for which I am solely and completely responsible. But I told the grand jury today and I say to you now that at no time did I ask anyone to lie, to hide or destroy evidence or to take any other unlawful action.

18. Whether our ancestors came here on the Mayflower, on slave ships, whether they came to Ellis Island or LAX in Los Angeles, whether they came yesterday or walked this land a thousand years ago our great challenge for the 21st century is to find a way to be One America. We can meet all the other challenges if we can go forward as One America.

19. A hundred years from tonight, another American President will stand in this place and report on the State of the Union. He-or she-(applause)-he or she will look back on a 21st century shaped in so many ways by the decisions we make here and now. So let it be said of us then that we were thinking not only of our time, but of their time; that we reached as high as our ideals; that we put aside our divisions and found a new hour of healing and hopefulness; that we joined together to serve and strengthen the land we love.

20. We want to live forever, and we're getting there.

21. You know, if I were a single man, I might ask that mummy out. That's a good-looking mummy.

22. Yesterday is yesterday. If we try to recapture it, we will only lose tomorrow.

23. When we got organized as a country and we wrote a fairly radical Constitution with a radical Bill of Rights, giving a radical amount of individual freedom to Americans, it was assumed that the Americans who had that freedom would use it responsibly:

24. History has shown us, that you can't allow the mass extermination of people, and just sit by and watch it happen.

25. Because Israel believes, when it comes right down to it America is the only big country that cares whether they live or die. That's why I can say, give up the West Bank, because the Israelis knew that if the Iraqi or the Iranian army came across the Jordan rival, I would personally grab a rifle, get in a ditch, and fight and die, and I would.

26. You should have disagreements with your leaders and your colleagues, but if it becomes immediately a question of questioning people's motives, and if immediately you decide that somebody who sees a whole new situation differently than you must be a bad person and somehow twisted inside, we are not going to get very far in forming a more perfect union.

27. And I think America, if we're ever going to truly defeat terror without changing the character of our own country or compromising the future of our children, has got to not only say, 'Okay, I want to shoulder my responsibilities, I want to create my share of opportunities' but we have to find a way to define the future in terms of a humanity that goes beyond our country, that goes beyond any particular race, that goes beyond any particular religion.

28. I felt like a pickle stepping into history.

29. People like you always help the far-right, because you like to hurt people, and you like to talk about how bad people are and all their personal failings.

30. Strength and wisdom are not opposing values.

31. What are the needs of the world? What can I do that won't be done if I don't do it?

32. What we have to do now is not to forget these people and places when all the cameras are not there. I think that's the most important message I can say to the American people right now.

33. We need a steady stream of cash. The American people have been uncommonly generous.

34. [Iraq is] not Vietnam, we have a government that has a support of the majority of the people.

35. If ever there comes a time when everyone you vote for wins and they do everything you think they should do, there will still be a gap between what is and what ought to be.

36. So I tried and failed. When I failed, I left a comprehensive anti-terror strategy and the best guy in the country, Dick Clarke, who got demoted. So you did Fox's bidding on this show. You did your nice little conservative hit job on me. ... And you've got that little smirk on your face and you think you're so clever. But I had responsibility for trying to protect this country. I tried and I failed to get bin Laden. I regret it. But I did try. And I did everything I thought I responsibly could.

37. The problem with ideology is, if you've got an ideology, you've already got your mind made up. You know all the answers and that makes evidence irrelevant and arguments a waste of time. You tend to govern by assertion and attacks.

38. I learned a lot from the stories my uncle, aunts, and grandparents told me: that no one is perfect but most people are good; that people can't be judged only by their worst or weakest moments; that harsh judgements make hypocrites of us all; that a lot of life is just showing up and hanging on; that laughter is often the best, and sometimes only response to pain.

39. I have met all the most gifted people in our generation and you're the best.

40. I think it would be a great thing if we had an election year where you had two people who loved this country and were devoted to the interest of this country. And people could actually ask themselves who is right on these issues, instead of all this other stuff that always seems to intrude itself on our politics.

41. If a politician doesn't wanna get beat up, he shouldn't run for office. If a football player doesn't want to get tackled or want the risk of an a occasional clip he shouldn't put the pads on.

42. Webb, if I put you over at Justice I want you to find the answers to two questions for me. One, who killed JFK? And two, are there UFOs?

43. If I did, I wouldn't tell you.

44. I think the country could be spared a lot of agony and the government could worry about inflation and a lot of other problems if [Nixon would] go on and resign. [There is] no question that an admission of making false statements to government officials and interfering with the FBI and the CIA is an impeachable offense.

45. Today, future belongs to freedom, not to fear.

46. It didn't happen under my administration. It happened under me.

47. Bill Clinton is generally viewed as one smart politician, having been twice elected the President, helped by lackluster Robert Dole, having survived the Lewinsky sex scandal, lying under oath about sex, and impeachment. When is it all about himself, he is cunningly smart.

48. The idea of Bill Clinton back in the White House with nothing to do is something I just can't imagine.

49. Then the big white whale, Clinton. What about someone who is a war criminal, a taker of bribes from foreign dictatorships, almost certainly a rapist (plausibly accused, anyway, by three believable women, of rape), executed a black man (Ricky Ray Rector) who was so mentally retarded that he was unable to plead or to understand the charges - You're against all that, right? But you're for it when it's someone who you think is a 'New Democrat'.

50. When our memories outweigh our dreams, we have grown old.

51. If you are for smaller government, then our candidate is for you. We are for better government and smaller government.

52. In a world darkened by ethnic conflicts that tear nations apart, Canada stands as a model of how people of different cultures can live and work together in peace, prosperity, and mutual respect.

53. Why would anyone make a hard decision again? What if we had immediate recall of every teacher, every preacher? What if kids could recall their parents?

54. Individual character involves honoring and embracing certain core ethical values; honesty, respect, responsibility . . . Parents must teach their children from the earliest age the difference between right and wrong. But we must all do our part.

55. There are large numbers of people who simply don't have the values and vision necessary to be part of an inter-dependent world. They think their differences -- whether religious, political, tribal or ethnic -- are more important than our common humanity. They believe the truth they have justifies their imposition of that truth on other people, even if it takes them to the death of innocents.

56. She could do any job. Let me just say this, I've never known anybody in politics that was more able than her -- including me. She's as good as anybody I've ever known.

57. No government really rooted in limited, parliamentary democracy should have the power to make its citizens fight and kill and die in a war they may oppose, a war which even possibly may be wrong, a war which, in any case, does not involve immediately the peace and freedom of the nation.

58. Despite the government's attempts to manipulate the vote, it does seem clear that the people have voted for change.

59. Create enough Government to crash the system.

60. I do not believe that the politics of personal destruction is what the American people are interested in.

61. We have the money to do this now and do it right.

62. All of us -- parents, schools, communities and government -- share responsibility to keep kids safe.

63. Today we can declare: Government is not the problem, and government is not the solution. We, the American people, we are the solution.

64. It's bad ethics and terrible economics. Take my money and make America well.

65. You, the American people, have made our passage into the global information age an era of great American renewal.

66. I am opposed to abortion and to government funding of abortions.

67. In god we trust, in me we surplus.

68. The purpose of government is to reign in the rights of the people.

69. There is no question that an admission of making false statements to government officials and interfering with the FBI and the CIA is an impeachable offense.