Quote

When you cover politics, you realize that knowing how to talk about character matters more and more. The way we hold ideas is more important than the ideas.

David Brooks

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David Brooks
Age: 63
Born: 1961
Born: August 22
Editor
Journalist
Politician
Pundit
City of Toronto
Important
Hold
Way
Realizing
Knowing
Politics
Talk
Character
Cover
Ideas
Matters
Matter
Realize

More quotes by David Brooks

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I think actually in any party it's a sign of general health to have different views, and especially on the subject of trade.
David Brooks
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We shouldn't just allow gay marriage. We should insist on gay marriage. We should regard it as scandalous that two people could claim to love each other and not want to sanctify their love with marriage and fidelity.
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Freedom without structure is its own slavery.
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Israel is a country of six million people. They need the U.S. It used to be bipartisan on Israeli politics. You never messed with that relationship. The fact that [ Benjamin] Netanyahu is willing to do that, I thought would horrify voters more than it turned out it did.
David Brooks
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I would like to see an animating passion. Tim Kaine actually had a good line. What animated you before you got into politics? And she actually does have a story there to tell about children. And so drawing that animating passion will do good.
David Brooks
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Some people think humility is thinking lowly of yourself. Some people think it's not thinking about yourself. But, to me, the best definition of humility is radical self-awareness from a distance, seeing themselves from a distance and saying, what's my problem?
David Brooks
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Just, as I have traveled around from school to school, whether it's project-based learning or an outward bound curriculum, it's very hard to tell the difference between charters and public anymore. There's no fine line.
David Brooks
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The daily activity that contributes most to happiness is having dinner with friends. The daily activity that detracts most from happiness is commuting. Eat more. Commute less.
David Brooks
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It's rare in an administration for a secretary of state and a secretary of defense to get along really well.
David Brooks
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My colleague Ross Douthat wrote that any time you give Donald Trump the benefit of the doubt, he always lets you down.
David Brooks
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How can we expect young people to be rooted in things such as character, morality and honesty? How is one supposed to be at once an arrow soaring skyward and an oak planted firmly in the ground? The meritocratic culture hones strivers on every aspect of their lives save one - how to cultivate character.
David Brooks
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Plunder is morally wrong. It ruins your credibility.
David Brooks
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I'm not the most emotionally attuned guy in the world. My wife says that me writing about emotion is like Gandhi writing about gluttony.
David Brooks
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Woe to you who insults the intelligence community, if you're president.
David Brooks
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Some children lack tools to see their course in the world in far-sighted ways. Just introducing school vouchers won't change that. You have to have nurse-home partnerships, early childhood education, mentoring programs and so on. People learn from people they love.
David Brooks
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The gun becomes this psychological totem, this thing of who I am. And it's almost as if using the gun is going to be the thing that's going to be my expression of how I make a difference in the world.
David Brooks
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No matter where you are on politics, I think it is wonderful to see candidates funding campaigns not by talking to a very small number of very rich people, but by reaching out to a very large number of citizens.
David Brooks
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The teachers union may not like Betsy DeVos, but she's clearly within the range of Republican policy-makers.
David Brooks
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I think the Democrats are right to protest, but I don't think Jeff Sessions is so far out of the range of normalcy that he shouldn't be confirmed.
David Brooks
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I happen to think most people go into government do it for the right reasons and they really do things as they see them on the merits of the issues.
David Brooks