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Civilization depends on, and civility often requires, the willingness to say, 'What you are doing is none of my business' and 'What I am doing is none of your business.'

George Will

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George Will
Age: 83
Born: 1941
Born: May 4
Columnist
Journalist
Champaign
Illinois
George F. Will
George Frederick Will
Business
Life
Civility
Willingness
Requires
None
Civilization
Depends
Often

More quotes by George Will

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The designs of the paper euros, introduced in 2002, proclaim a utopian aspiration. Gone are the colorful bills of particular nations, featuring pictures of national heroes of statecraft, culture and the arts, pictures celebrating unique national narratives. With the euro, 16 nations have said goodbye to all that.
George Will
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In the annals of American blunders, the Bay of Pigs may have been even more feckless, and the invasion of Iraq more costly, but we cannot yet calculate the cost of teaching Iran and others, by our role in the casual overthrow of Moammar Gaddafi, the peril of not having nuclear weapons.
George Will
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[President George W.] Bush - never mind his well-crafted set speeches listen to him as he leans on a lectern, chatting to an audience of carpenters - is completely comfortable being himself, a skill still eluding Gore in his 55th year.
George Will
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On a throne at the center of a sense of humor sits a capacity for irony. All wit rests on a cheerful awareness of life's incongruities. It is a gentling awareness, and no politician without it should be allowed near power.
George Will
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A properly functioning free market system does not spring spontaneously from society's soil as crabgrass springs from suburban lawns. Rather, it is a complex creation of laws and mores... Capitalism is a government program.
George Will
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Revisiting the Revolutionary War is a bracing reminder that the fate of a continent, and the shape of the modern world, turned on the free choices of remarkably few Americans defying an empire.
George Will
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In September 1942 the U.S. government purchased 58,575 acres of wilderness in eastern Tennessee. Soon there was a town, Oak Ridge, and amazing scientific facilities. Thirty-four months after the purchase, an atomic blast lit the New Mexico desert. After 43 months in Iraq, U.S. forces still struggle to cope with improvised explosive devices.
George Will
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All I remember about my wedding day in 1967 is that the Cubs lost a double-header.
George Will
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The nice part about being a pessimist is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised.
George Will
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The First Amendment is not a blanket freedom-of-information act. The constitutional newsgathering freedom means the media can go where the public can, but enjoys no superior right of access.
George Will
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The phrase 'domestic cat' is an oxymoron.
George Will
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I am opposed to term limits because if we did not have seasoned professionals, we would not have the good government that we have.
George Will
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The education of this president [Obama] is a protracted and often amusing process . . . as he continues to alight upon the obvious with a sense of profound and original discovery.
George Will
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Politics in a democracy is transactional: Politicians seek votes by promising to do things for voters, who seek promises in exchange for their votes.
George Will
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Sports serve society by providing vivid examples of excellence.
George Will
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A politician's words reveal less about what he thinks about his subject than what he thinks about his audience.
George Will
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Term limits would make Congress bolder, more independent, and less risk-averse.
George Will
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I say statecraft is soulcraft. Just as all education is moral education because learning conditions conduct, most legislation is moral legislations because it conditions the action and the thought of the nation in broad and important spheres in life.
George Will
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Arizona's law makes what is already a federal offense - being in the country illegally - a state offense. Some critics seem not to understand Arizona's right to assert concurrent jurisdiction.
George Will
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The cost of appearing with a bloviating ignoramus is obvious, it seems to me. Donald Trump is redundant evidence that if your net worth is high enough, your IQ can be very low and you can still intrude into American politics.
George Will