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Good and solid analysis and a formal way of looking at a problem [are the core ingredients of good decisions].

Colin Powell

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Colin Powell
Age: 87
Born: 1937
Born: April 5
Diplomat
Former United States Secretary Of State
Politician
Soldier
New York City
New York
Colin Luther Powell
Good
Solid
Analysis
Decisions
Core
Decision
Looking
Problem
Ingredients
Way
Formal

More quotes by Colin Powell

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Well, the correct answer is he is not a Muslim, he’s a Christian. He’s always been a Christian. But the really right answer is, what if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country?
Colin Powell
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Give me the right people and I don’t much care what organization you give me. Good things will happen. Give me the wrong people and it doesn’t matter what you do with the organization. Bad things will happen.
Colin Powell
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Let it [racism] be a problem to someone else... Let it drag them down. Don't use it as an excuse for your own shortcomings.
Colin Powell
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I think all of the attention of the world, to include the attention of the Arab world, should be on Saddam Hussein and whether or not he is prepared to give up the weapons of mass destruction that he has used to terrorise the region.
Colin Powell
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The person who will decide whether or not there will be war or peace is Saddam Hussein, and all he has to do is give up these terrible weapons that he has used to kill fellow Arabs, fellow Muslims in that part of the world, and to step away from his past behaviour which invaded neighbouring countries.
Colin Powell
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We are rather candid with them about the nature of their political processes and the state of development of their institutions, but they are looking to the West because they know that's where success lies.
Colin Powell
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Decision-making is lonely.
Colin Powell
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Everybody makes bad decisions. I am sure I have made my share of them over 40 years of service. Or I have made good decisions and have been overruled. The real challenge, when you are overruled, is to remember who the boss is and don't take it personally.
Colin Powell
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Leadership is solving problems. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.
Colin Powell
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We want to approach this in a multilateral way, talking with our friends, consulting with our security council colleagues in the United Nations, hoping to find a way to solve this peacefully, but at the same time recognising that unless the threat of military force is there, Iraq will not disarm.
Colin Powell
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Nobody has ever said in the United States government that we are going to war next month. No decision has been made by the president because, as he said to the United Nations, he wants the United Nations to live up to its responsibilities and he wants Saddam Hussein to cooperate.
Colin Powell
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Almost invariably, whoever doesn't win the argument is going to be unhappy.
Colin Powell
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The healthiest competition occurs when average people win by putting above average effort.
Colin Powell
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As I've thought about gay marriage, I don't see any reason not to say that [couples] should be able to get married.
Colin Powell
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None of us can change our yesterdays but all of us can change our tomorrows.
Colin Powell
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The best leaders are those who break that mission down into the organization's constituent parts, so that everybody understands their role and how it all builds into the whole.
Colin Powell
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It is not our place to decide who should lead the Iraqi people. If Saddam [Hussein] leaves or has to be forced out of power and a new regime brought in, a new leadership brought in, I am confident it will be some combination of people inside the country and outside the country.
Colin Powell
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The purposes of the United States should not be doubted. The Security Council resolutions will be enforced - the just demands of peace and security will be met - or action will be unavoidable. And a regime that has lost its legitimacy will also lose its power.
Colin Powell
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In the army, all combat officers are taught the Estimate of the Situation: When you are faced with a problem - take that hill, or in business maybe grow your market share - the first thing you do is to make an analysis of your environment.
Colin Powell
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The president's personal staff has a unique role.
Colin Powell