I try to use the Australian idiom to its maximum advantage.

I try to use the Australian idiom to its maximum advantage.

If one takes pride in one's craft, you won't let a good thing die. Risking it through not pushing hard enough is not a humility.

I always believed in burning up the government's political capital, not being Mr Safe Guy, you know?

I think Australia has to be a country which has the 'Welcome' sign out.

I think the Australian people are very conscientious. During the 1980s and 1990s we proved they will respond conscientiously to necessary reforms. They mightn't like them but they'll accept them. But reforms have to be presented in a digestible format.

I think the rise of China is one of the great events of all economic and human history, and I think this will be overwhelmingly a positive thing for the region and the world.

I used to say in the cabinet room, 'confidence is not like a can of Popeye spinach - you can't take the top off and swallow it down.' You know, confidence has to be earned.

I've always held the view that great states need strategic space. I mean, George Washington took his space from George III. Britain took it from just about everybody. Russia took all of Eastern Europe. Germany's taken it from everywhere they can, and China will want its space too.

In the end, rational policy is always good.

Nobody wants to have in their CV in the upper echelons of the American economic family that they nationalised major banks.

One tires of combat, although I can still throw a punch, you know.

Politicians come in three varieties: straight men, fixers, and maddies.

The G7, just a European centric show, an Atlantic show, is fundamentally finished.

The United States being in Asia is unambiguously a good thing for the region.

The great changes in civilisation and society have been wrought by deeply held beliefs and passion rather than by a process of rational deduction.

The great curse of modern political life is incrementalism.

Well, Australians should speak for the national interests of Australia, and whatever role former Australian prime ministers may have, one of the things you do is speak frankly about the country as you see the country's best interests, you know?

Well, I think that - I think leadership's always been about two main things: imagination and courage.

When the Berlin Wall came down the Americans cried, 'Victory,' and walked off the field.

You get one chance to do something about native title. You get perhaps one chance in your life to do something about a republic. You get one chance, your chance, to build a piece of the political architecture in the Pacific. I wasn't going to give those up.

You know, in the WikiLeaks cables, the Chinese discovered that Kevin Rudd was urging the Americans to keep the military option open against them. This is hardly a friendly gesture.

You see, before I became prime minister, the Australian prime minister only attended ever two meetings in the world: the British Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting and the South Pacific Forum.

You see, psychologically, Australia must understand it has to live in the region around it. Australia must find its security in Asia; it cannot find its security from Asia.

The more we view the country through the prism of Aboriginality, the more likely we are to get the angle right.

Good economics is good politics.

He is simply a shiver looking for a spine to run up

About two months ago I finished a gospel tour.

A lot of actors think they can't be happy without the acting... But I think I couldn't be happy with it anymore.

Christians should emphatically be campaigning for justice for the poor - but the Church is not a campaign.

Nice girls aren't always what they seem.

My greatest sense of accomplishment has come from having two amazing sons, but it's also a paradox in that the times when I felt like the biggest failure have been times when I felt like, as a parent, I wasn't making the right decisions or succeeding in the way that I should.

As much as we might look for opportunities to keep Iraq together, we need to be prepared for the reality that it's not going to stay together.

Nothing can make injustice just but mercy.

The more you can increase fear of drugs and crime, welfare mothers, immigrants and aliens, the more you control all the people.

Drinking makes such fools of people and people are such fools to begin with that its compounding a felony.

To succeed in life, you need two things: ignorance and confidence.

With acting, I felt like I had a lot to prove because I didn't study it; I didn't work my way up in a traditional sense.

I have never been jealous. Not even when my dad finished fifth grade a year before I did.

I love bleak things.

People and their religions don't affect me.

So without getting into the specifics, I can tell you that to the extent that investigation is a relatively important investigation and meaningful, the president would have been periodically briefed.

Every film can be fun, even if it's a terror.

I don't have a burning desire to be taken seriously as an actor. I don't have a master plan in that way.

Humility may well be one of the most difficult of the fruit of the Spirit to be cultivated in us - and to maintain. That's because without humility, it's not likely that you will put your complete trust in God.

We've got to be right mentally - to stay focused and not get carried away if results go our way.

We love because it is the only true adventure.

For the life of me, I'll never understand how you can be an artist but not want people to understand who you are as a person.

Studios are passe for me. I'd rather play in a garage, in a truck, or a rehearsal hall, a club, or a basement.