Home
Authors
Tags
App
Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App
" I like that lady - Sarah Palin. She's great. I like the cut of her jib. "
Paul Johnson
Great
She
Like
Related Quotes:
" The United States is a concept that works very well, even in bad times. But that's no reason to think its structure can be superimposed with success on any other part of the world, particularly when times are terrible. "
Paul Johnson
Think
World
Bad Times
" Next to courage, willpower is the most important thing in politics. "
Paul Johnson
Courage
Politics
Important
" I don't write huge books any more. I used to write 1,000 printed pages, but now I write short books. I did one on Napoleon, 50,000 words - enjoyed doing that. He was a baddie. I did one on Churchill, which was a bestseller in New York, I'm glad to say. 50,000 words. He was a goodie. "
Paul Johnson
Words
Short
Now
" A capitalist economy hums when leading businessmen are bubbling with animal spirits and are prepared to sink their money into risky ventures. "
Paul Johnson
Leading
Animal
Economy
" Those who buy in to global warming wish to drastically curb human economic and industrial activities, regardless of the consequences for people, especially the poor. "
Paul Johnson
Consequences
People
Wish
" At some time in their careers, most good historians itch to write a history of the world, endeavor to discover what makes humanity the most destructive and creative of species. "
Paul Johnson
World
Time
History
" If anti-Semitism is a variety of racism, it is a most peculiar variety, with many unique characteristics. In my view as a historian, it is so peculiar that it deserves to be placed in a quite different category. I would call it an intellectual disease, a disease of the mind, extremely infectious and massively destructive. "
Paul Johnson
Unique
View
Intellectual
" One of the categories of people I don't like much are intellectuals. People say, 'Oh, you're an intellectual,' and I say, 'No!' What is an intellectual? An intellectual is somebody who thinks ideas are more important than people. "
Paul Johnson
Ideas
Important
More
" Euphemism is a human device to conceal the horrors of reality. "
Paul Johnson
Reality
Human
Conceal
" I was very fond of Princess Diana. She used to have me over to lunch to ask my advice. I'd give her good advice, and she'd say: 'I entirely agree. Paul, you're so right.' Then she'd go and do the opposite. "
Paul Johnson
You
Princess
Good
" In the long term, it is desirable that the human race, faced with the prospect of extinction on Earth, should prepare an escape route for itself to another inhabitable planet. "
Paul Johnson
Escape
Long
Human
" It would be wrong to say I enjoy having rows, because that would be un-Christian. If people attack me, then I respond, or if they do very wicked things. Then they must be brought to book. "
Paul Johnson
Say
Wrong
People
" The most evil person I ever met was a toss-up between Pablo Picasso and the publisher-crook Robert Maxwell. "
Paul Johnson
Met
Person
Evil
" Democracy has many enemies, and the terrorist is only one of them. "
Paul Johnson
Only
Them
Enemies
" The only thing to be said for air travel is speed. It makes possible travel on a scale unimaginable before our present age. Between the ages of 20 and four-score I visited every country in Europe, all save two in Latin America, ditto in Africa, and most of Asia, not counting eight trips to Australia and 60 to the United States - all by air. "
Paul Johnson
Travel
Age
America
" In all its myriad manifestations, the language of anti-Semitism through the ages is a dictionary of non-sequiturs and antonyms, a thesaurus of illogic and inconsistency. "
Paul Johnson
Ages
Language
Dictionary
" What strikes the historian surveying anti-Semitism worldwide over more than two millennia is its fundamental irrationality. It seems to make no sense, any more than malaria or meningitis makes sense. "
Paul Johnson
Over
Seems
Sense
" I very much wanted to be editor of the 'New Statesman!' But I never wanted to be prime minister, except maybe as a little boy. "
Paul Johnson
Never
Boy
Little
" Like many physical diseases, anti-Semitism is highly infectious, and can become endemic in certain localities and societies. Though a disease of the mind, it is by no means confined to weak, feeble, or commonplace intellects; as history sadly records, its carriers have included men and women of otherwise powerful and subtle thoughts. "
Paul Johnson
Thoughts
Men
History
" I very much wanted to live in Paris when I was in the army, and I was quite determined to. I could have become a dress designer: Dior was willing to take me on as an assistant, but he did not have an immediate vacancy. "
Paul Johnson
Me
Live
Army
" Germany's Angela Merkel exudes an atmosphere of elderly exhaustion and pooped-out pessimism. Britain's David Cameron, though by nature exuberant, feels he has to look and sound glum. And France's leader, Francois Hollande, seems determined to drive every successful businessman out of the country. "
Paul Johnson
Look
Drive
Successful
" The planet Earth, though not threatened with destruction by man-made global warming, is by no means indestructible. There are many unpredictable events within our solar system, and still more outside it, that could make Earth uninhabitable by humans. "
Paul Johnson
Global Warming
Earth
Solar
" The idea that human beings have changed and are changing the basic climate system of the Earth through their industrial activities and burning of fossil fuels - the essence of the Greens' theory of global warming - has about as much basis in science as Marxism and Freudianism. "
Paul Johnson
Global Warming
Earth
Human
" The freedom enjoyed in Western society under the rule of law and constitutional government explains both the quality of its civilization and its wealth. "
Paul Johnson
Quality
Society
Government
" Margaret Thatcher had more impact on the world than any woman ruler since Catherine the Great of Russia. Not only did she turn around - decisively - the British economy in the 1980s, she also saw her methods copied in more than 50 countries. "
Paul Johnson
Woman
Impact
Great
" Indeed it is the protean ability of Western civilization to be self-critical and self-correcting - not only in producing wealth but over the whole range of human activities - that constitutes its most decisive superiority over any of its rivals. "
Paul Johnson
Only
Wealth
Civilization
" In the past, the U.S. has shown its capacity to reinvent its gifts for leadership. During the 1970s, in the aftermath of the Nixon abdication and the Ford and Carter presidencies, the whole nation peered into the abyss, was horrified by what it saw and elected Ronald Reagan as president, which began a national resurgence. "
Paul Johnson
Gifts
Past
Nation
" As a child I found railroad stations exciting, mysterious, and even beautiful, as indeed they often were. "
Paul Johnson
Railroad
Mysterious
Child
" The most intimidating world leader was Lyndon Johnson, who became U.S. President when John Kennedy was assassinated. He exulted in this power and liked to inspire fear. "
Paul Johnson
Who
Fear
Power
" When people talk about political correctness, the only element of any value is good manners. "
Paul Johnson
Value
Good
Manners