I learned in business that you had to be very careful when you told somebody that's working for you to do something, because the chances were very high he'd do it. In government, you don't have to worry about that.

Nothing ever gets settled in this town. a seething debating society in which the debate never stops, in which people never give up, including me. And so that's the atmosphere in which you administer.

The higher the classification of secrecy, the quicker you will report it.

Oh, you know. I am secretary of state. My trips aren't successful. I just talk to people.

You've got to dream a little bit if you're going to get somewhere.

It was an attempt to stick the Congress's finger in King Hussein's eye.

I learned in business that you had to be very careful when you told somebody that's working for you to do something, because the chances were very high he'd do it. In government, you don't have to worry about that.

Between 1980 and 1990, the number of countries that were classified as 'free' or 'mostly free' increased by about 50%.

I don't know how you define 'neoconservatism,' but I think it's associated with trying to spread open political systems and democracy.

I think the idea that you would do everything you can to prevent what is coming at you by way of something very disruptive - a 9/11 - it's a no-brainer.

I want my grandchildren to be proud of me. That's the main thing.

I've always tried to live in the future and think about things and how to make things better. If you have great-grandchildren around, and their pictures are looking at you, well, that's the future.

If you ask me what am I, I might say 'I am a Californian,' and if George Bush were here, he would say 'I am a Texan.'

Increasingly, the state system has been eroding. Terrorists have exploited this weakness by burrowing into the state system in order to attack it.

My experience is that if the military didn't want to use force and was confronted with a president that did, the military would come back with what I would call the 'bomb Moscow' scenario. They would say it had to be done with conditions that were so extreme, you obviously wouldn't do it.

Obama seems to want to do something to damage rich people.

Open political and economic systems have been gaining ground and there's a good reason for it. They work better.

Strong growth means increased use of energy at a pace that can strain the capacity to supply what is needed at a reasonable price.

Terrorism is not a matter that can be left to law enforcement, with its deliberative process, built-in delays, and safeguards that may let the prisoner go free on procedural grounds.

The 1986 tax act is sort of the unsung hero of the very good economic times we had for a long time. Of course, politics gums it all up again and preferences get put in.

The armed forces are paying a lot more attention to the use of energy. The Air Force has realized that the paint on planes is heavy, so there are going to be a lot more silver planes, or planes painted in a less heavy way, so that you are using less fuel to get from point A to point B.

The civilized world has a common stake in defeating the terrorists.

The source of all the energy is the sun. The big challenge is, how do you use all of that energy? Solar power has to fascinate you. There have been strides to get the costs down, and if this will work, you have to get costs down so it is competitive with fossil fuels.

There is no prospect that the United States will say to Israel, 'You do such and such and we'll not support you in your security.'

We have struggled with terrorism for a long time. In the Reagan administration, I was a hawk on the subject. I said terrorism is a big problem, a different problem, and we have to take forceful action against it. Fortunately, Ronald Reagan agreed with me, but not many others did.

What we want is scientists who don't become part of the policy discussion: All they do is produce science. If someone becomes an advocate, then I won't pay as much attention to their science.

You don't get gushers of revenue by raising tax rates. You get it through expansion.

Natural resources are so vast that no single individual or business is going to protect them; they don't have an incentive to.

The bronze powder business, however, no longer required my personal attention, and was well managed by those I had chosen as the guardians of a secret, which was long and honourably kept.

I have done things politically, and I've been running a business at the same time, but I sort of joke that to some extent I do more than most legislators have done in their whole careers, and I've been doing it as a part-time job.

Howard Hughes himself was a regular at the restaurant, and in a way it became his headquarters, too. Howard had recently relocated to Las Vegas, so when he wanted to do business in Los Angeles, he went into the back of our restaurant to use the telephone.

Prosperous farmers mean more employment, more prosperity for the workers and the business men of every industrial area in the whole country.

My parents were amazing people who had no business being together - and they knew it.

We mean by "politics" the people's business - the most important business there is.

Slovakia's joining the OECD in 1999 is totally dependent on meeting economic reforms required such as transparency and legislation that permits fair and open conduct of trade and business.

The way the business things work in Russia is you have to meet people, you have to go through a certain amount of etiquette and business things are done just simply by a shake of the hand and whether they like you or not.

I make no claim to being a business genius. You can make so much money in this business that it loses its value.

It costs a great deal of money to do a musical, and the more money involved, the more big business influences the artform.

It's a very hard and competitive business in which you have to fight every day in order to impose yourself.

I know the history of the record business so well because I followed Billie Holiday into the record studios. It was so primitive compared to the sophisticated business today.

Chicago kept industry, attracted new business, became the center for convention trade and transportation.

I have been, and will go on, fighting that damnable, dirty, rotten business with all the power at my command.

All business success rests on something labeled a sale, which at least momentarily weds company and customer.

I knew an actor's career goes up and down and back up again. Your standing in this business can't be your whole identity; otherwise, you're doomed.

The surest way to return to the people's business is to listen to the people themselves: We need to drop this whole scheme of federally controlled health care, start over, and work together on real reforms at the state level that will contain costs and won't leave America trillions of dollars deeper in debt.

Again, I say I will be glad to tell what songs I have ever sung, because singing is my business.

You have to be a star to be in this business.

The government must do all it can to help reduce interest rates for business.

Do what you love to do and give it your very best. Whether it's business or baseball, or the theater, or any field. If you don't love what you're doing and you can't give it your best, get out of it. Life is too short. You'll be an old man before you know it.