Mark Shields
Kevin McCarthy, who is the House majority leader, was pretty open. He went out and recruited candidates. And the Republicans in the House have paid a price for it ever since, because they cannot pass anything comprehensive or real because of the Freedom Caucus, which is the child, the product, the progeny of the Tea Party.Collection: Children
Donald Trump, I hate to tell people who are concerned about it, is not going to be impeached. The American people believe in giving somebody a fair chance. He's a new president. There have been troubles, there have been problems.Collection: Hate
Whether it's her [ Hillary Clinton] guarded privacy or whatever else, I mean, there has got to be some sense that this is a human being that I can identify.Collection: Mean
We're not being invaded by undocumented immigrants who are coming to kill police officers and commit crimes. And I don't think most Americans think it's true.Collection: Thinking
Democrats, if they're smart and they're not brain-dead, are doing two things right now.They're having self-deprecating humor written for them. There was no humor in Cleveland. And they are not making this a Donald Trump.Collection: Smart
By a 2-1 margin, voters believe that Donald Trump would change business as usual in Washington, but by almost as large a margin, they believe that Hillary Clinton would be better in a crisis and less of a decisive margin she cares about people like them.Collection: Believe
It's not fair that a Palestinian child cannot grow up in a state of their own, living their entire lives in the presence of a foreign army that controls the movements of the parents every single day.Collection: Children
Donald Trump is not an unintelligent man.Collection: Men
Americans don't like the way Washington operates. They don't like Washington. They don't like the way things are going.Collection: Way
Peter Hart, the pollster, has a question when he asks about presidential or vice presidential candidates, what kind of a neighbor would they be? And several Democrats - George W. Bush was always seen to be a good friendly neighbor who would pick up the newspapers if you were out of town or check your mail.Collection: Good Friend
For the Democrats, they're trying to avoid having the [Ben] Sanders- [Hillary] Clinton debate over and over again. But, to some degree, they're sentenced to that debate.Collection: Trying
We have weakened the parties and strengthened all the special interests.Collection: Party
In the past, in order to continue as a candidate, a serious candidate, you had to be in the top three finishes in Iowa. You had to be in the top two out of New Hampshire. All our presidents elected in the past half-century finished either first or second in New Hampshire and in the top three in Iowa. That changed with the Citizens United, when we gave unlimited amounts of money.Collection: Past
For many years, we have had these campaign finance reforms, and they have been failures. Money is more coursing through our system than ever before. Incumbents have used the laws to advantage themselves. And one of the reasons I think they have been failures is we have tried to crush down the money in places like the political parties, and it has squished out into opaque super PACs and sort of hidden channels.Collection: Crush
The Democrats have tried the war against women in the past. It didn't really have that much traction.Collection: War
One of the first things every press secretary assures you is, the boss has a wonderful sense of humor, because not to have a sense of humor is considered flagrantly un-American.Collection: Boss
Campaigns are fun. Campaigns are police escorts, they're airplanes, they're crowds, they're balloons, they're bands, a lot of fun. You speak in vague generalities. You get applause for slogans. And then governing comes. And governing is tedious and it's difficult an it's time-consuming and it demands your attention. And policy isn't vague generalities. It's specifics and it's based on knowledge.Collection: Fun
The problem is that what Donald Trump said, if you take it literally now, is cause for anxiety and nervousness.Collection: Anxiety
Once I accuse you of racist, I have demonized you, and it means any future collaboration, cooperation between us is a sign of my moral deficiency, if I would deal with someone like that. It's a terrible thing to do.Collection: Mean
Stronger together is, I think, a preposition and a comparative adjective, but it's not really an action verb or what it is.Collection: Thinking
Mitt Romney was the man who stood up to Donald Trump early, hard, never wavered.Collection: Men
America is Republican until 5:00 or 6:00 at night.Collection: Night
Donald Trump is sounding the same theme he has sounded since May or June of 2015.Collection: June
The Democrats are now an upscale party.Collection: Party
Democrats can have a different version of the line, or they can just say, no, we are the party of international peace and activism, and we're the party that's going to have a civilized capitalism.Collection: Party
That's the job of a free press is to hold the lamp up, to investigate, to hold accountable. And denying access, as Sean Spicer did , is the first step toward a dictatorship.Collection: Jobs
I think Hillary Clinton - first of all, it's a great victory, acknowledge it. She has made history.Collection: Thinking
Hillary Clinton, at the end of the debate, what you want viewers to say, yes, she's smart, she's knowledgeable, but she's not a bad egg, you know? Not a bad egg is a pretty high compliment in American politics, given the toxic atmosphere in which we currently dwell.Collection: Smart
I'm sure little Marco [Rubio] didn't think it would stick. I'm sure crooked Hillary [Clinton] didn't think it would stick. These labels do have a certain power to them. And so we will see how it plays out.Collection: Thinking
It's both strategic, to get people's minds off other things, and to pick an internal enemy. It's part of [Donald Trump's] psychodynamics to always care about his press coverage intensely. He's more interested in that than anything else.Collection: People
It's interesting how identity politics and Ann Coulter-style tactics have now blossomed. But they were always there in CPAC.Collection: Identity Politics
Lee Atwater,[Ronald] Reagan's strategist, had no patience for CPAC, because he thought they were sort of wild and immature, basically.Collection: Immature
Basically, global capitalism, basically to support it, or is it to be opposed? Is international order to be supported, or is it to be opposed? Republicans have taken a very clear line.Collection: Taken
Franklin Roosevelt had a pretty clear line. Ronald Reagan had a pretty clear line, people who rescue parties.Collection: Party
[Hillary] Clinton is much more embracing of the global economy and the international world order. [Ben] Sanders and [Scott] Warren are much less so.Collection: Order
Mitt Romney looks like a secretary of state. He looks like the chancellor of the exchequer.Collection: Looks
Tim Kaine reminds me of - Peter Hart.Tim Kaine is a good neighbor. He's kind of the dependable, you know, friendly, helpful. And, you know, he would be over there. He would give you a hand if there were a problem at the house.Collection: Hands
The pattern of American presidential elections is that the more optimistic candidate, whether it's John Kennedy and let's get America moving again, Ronald Reagan, it's morning in America, or Barack Obama, yes, we can, always wins, or nearly always wins.Collection: Morning
[Donald trump] is moved from the enemy being Barack Obama, now gone, fading is Hillary Clinton, and there is no question he's chosen the enemy.Collection: Enemy
Donald Trump is writing a different theme, which is it's midnight in America and that things are bad, and they're bleak, and they're gloomy and they're doomy, and the only thing that is going to save you is someone with the authority and power of somebody like me.Collection: Writing
The uncritically admiring supporters and friends of the prime minister [Benjamin Netanyahu], in whose ranks I certainly don't include David [Brooks], but include Charles Krauthammer, the columnist, and Mike Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas, insist on comparing him to the incomparable leader of the British forces in country in part of - during World War II.Collection: Country
There is no tougher job in America than being a cop on the beat in a major city in this country, big and brawling.Collection: Country
I saw money change votes.I mean, they just seem unaware of this, that money is something - if they want to see the appearance of corruption, all they had to do was look in Las Vegas last weekend.Collection: Mean
Health care, it's going to be political. It's going to be, let's say, the confluence of the politics and the messy implementation.Collection: Political
As long as Republicans won't - won't raise taxes and as long as Democrats won't in any way make entitlements based on need, rather than just across the board, I really think that we're doomed to this deadlock.Collection: Thinking
[In politics] when A goes after B and there's a C, and D and a Q all lined up there, you have no idea who's going to be the beneficiary.Collection: Ideas
The lobbying over China most favored nation trading status was disgusting. There's no way in hell that MFN would have passed in '95, '96, '97, '98, '99, 2000 if all these companies hadn't come in flooding and making campaign contributions and ask for people's support. That drove the debate. Every year was the allure of corporate dollars flooding into members' bank accounts.Collection: Years
Now the Republicans have a very low-scale, by economic standards, base. Donald Trump has.Collection: Republican
The other thing that has changed - and this is more detailed to CPAC than the general Republican Party - is they have always been an outsider, Ann Coulter, sort of protest style, a little ruder than most Republicans. And this goes back all the way to [Ronald] Reagan.Collection: Party