Quote

I'm a true reactionary. Like all patricians, I'd like to restore the original republic, which we lost 40 years ago when Harry Truman imposed the national security state on us, which has kept us at war, hot or cold, for almost half a century, and it's got us $4 trillion into debt.

Gore Vidal

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Gore Vidal
Age: 86 †
Born: 1925
Born: October 3
Died: 2012
Died: July 31
Actor
Essayist
Journalist
Literary Critic
Non-Fiction Writer
Novelist
Opinion Journalist
Playwright
Politician
Prosaist
West Point
New York
Eugene Luther Gore Vidal
Gor Vidal
Cameron Kay
Eugene Luther Vidal
Edgar Box
Katherine Everard
Eugene Vidal
Half
Kept
Trillion
War
Debt
Restore
Lost
National
Imposed
True
Cold
Harry
States
Security
Republic
Years
Century
Hot
Reactionary
Like
Almost
Originals
Truman
State
Original
Reactionaries

More quotes by Gore Vidal

Image
Obviously I'm in favor of protecting the rights of everybody: gay, black, women, what have you, American Indians.
Gore Vidal
Image
As one gets older, litigation replaces sex.
Gore Vidal
Image
Instead of finding alternative energy sources, we try to subjugate entire regions of the world. People do not understand that by doing this, the United States are going to absolute ruin.
Gore Vidal
Image
The fool is often oblivious of his own gaucherie.
Gore Vidal
Image
I can understand companionship. I can understand bought sex in the afternoon, but I cannot understand the love affair.
Gore Vidal
Image
Since nothing is free, to each his price.
Gore Vidal
Image
There is no human problem which could not be solved if people would simply do as I advise.
Gore Vidal
Image
We affect one another quite enough merely by existing. Whenever the stars cross, or is it comets? fragments pass briefly from one orbit to another. On rare occasions there is total collision, but most often the two simply continue without incident, neither losing more than a particle to the other, in passing.
Gore Vidal
Image
Truman Capote has made lying an art. A minor art.
Gore Vidal
Image
No reform ever came from the bottom, and it was always people who understood how the ruling class worked who turned out to be the reformers.
Gore Vidal
Image
...you will do more harm than good by attempting to supplant old dogmas and customs with new dogmas. It will be the same in the end except that the old is less militant, less dangerous than a new order imposed by enthusiasts.
Gore Vidal
Image
It is reasonable to assume that, by and large, what is not read now will not be read, ever. It is also reasonable to assume that practically nothing that is read now will be read later.
Gore Vidal
Image
Commercialism is doing well that which should not be done at all.
Gore Vidal
Image
Maybe there is no good God. But there is definitely a devil, and his predominant passion is the religion of Protestant fundamentalists. I believe my country is beginning to resemble a theocracy. Using television, the evangelists raise appalling amounts of money which they then invest in the election of mentally disabled obscurantists.
Gore Vidal
Image
The word 'radical' derives from the Latin word for root. Therefore, if you want to get to the root of anything you must be radical. It is no accident that the word has now been totally demonized.
Gore Vidal
Image
It makes no difference who you vote for - the two parties are really one party representing four percent of the people.
Gore Vidal
Image
It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail.
Gore Vidal
Image
If you're a critic of the rulers of the United States, you are either demonized, or you are trivialized by the press, and they do a very good job of making you into a non-person or a ridiculous person.
Gore Vidal
Image
Persuading the people to vote against their own best interests has been the awesome genius of the American political elite from the beginning.
Gore Vidal
Image
I'm in favor of any form of sexual relationship that gives pleasure to those involved. And I have never heard a convincing argument to the contrary.
Gore Vidal