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We are trying to remake Vietnamese society, a task which certainly cannot be accomplished by force and which probably cannot be accomplished by any means available to outsiders.
J. William Fulbright
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J. William Fulbright
Age: 89 †
Born: 1905
Born: April 9
Died: 1995
Died: February 9
Banker
Farmer
Former United States Senator
Instructor
Lawyer
Lecturer
Politician
President
Sumner
Missouri
James William Fulbright
William Fulbright
Trying
Available
Certainly
Remake
Probably
Vietnamese
Society
Remakes
Force
Outsiders
Means
Accomplished
Cannot
Task
Mean
Tasks
More quotes by J. William Fulbright
We have the power to do any damn fool thing we want to do, and we seem to do it about every ten minutes.
J. William Fulbright
There is an inevitable divergence between the world as it is and the world as men perceive it.
J. William Fulbright
Insofar as it represents a genuine reconciliation of differences, a consensus is a fine thing insofar as it represents a concealment of differences, it is a miscarriage of democratic procedure.
J. William Fulbright
When public men indulge themselves in abuse, when they deny others a fair trial, when they resort to innuendo and insinuation, to libel, scandal, and suspicion, then our democratic society is outraged, and democracy is baffled. It has no apparatus to deal with the boor, the liar, the lout, and the antidemocrat in general.
J. William Fulbright
The cause of our difficulties in southeast Asia is not a deficiency of power but an excess of the wrong kind of power which results in a feeling of impotence when it fails to achieve its desired ends.
J. William Fulbright
Power confuses itself with virtue and tends also to take itself for omnipotence.
J. William Fulbright
The greatest single virtue of a strong legislature is not what it can do, but what it can prevent.
J. William Fulbright
The rapprochement of peoples is only possible when differences of culture and outlook are respected and appreciated rather than feared and condemned, when the common bond of human dignity is recognized as the essential bond for a peaceful world.
J. William Fulbright
There has been a tendency through the years for reason and moderation to prevail as long as things are going tolerably well or as long as our problems seem clear and finite and manageable.
J. William Fulbright
Naturepitiless in a pitiless universeis certainly not concerned with the survival of Americans or, for that matter, of any of the two billion people now inhabiting this earth. Hence, our destiny, with the aid of God, remains in our own hands.
J. William Fulbright
Education is the best means-probably the only means-by which nations can cultivate a degree of objectivity about each other's behavior and intentions. It is the means by which Russians and Americans can come to understand each others' aspirations for peace and how the satisfactions of everyday life may be achieved.
J. William Fulbright
In a democracy dissent is an act of faith. Like medicine, the test of its value is not in its taste, but in its effects.
J. William Fulbright
I do not think it is selling America short when we ask a great deal of her on the contrary, it is those who ask nothing, those who see no fault, who are really selling America short!
J. William Fulbright
A nation's budget is full of moral implications it tells what a society cares about and what it does not care about it tells what its values are.
J. William Fulbright
I'm sure that President Johnson would never have pursued the war in Vietnam if he'd ever had a Fulbright to Japan, or say Bangkok, or had any feeling for what these people are like and why they acted the way they did. He was completely ignorant.
J. William Fulbright
It is a curiosity of human nature that lack of self-assurance seems to breed an exaggerated sense of power and mission.
J. William Fulbright
When we violate the law ourselves, whatever short-term advantage may be gained, we are obviously encouraging others to violate the law we thus encourage disorder and instability and thereby do incalculable damage to our own long-term interests.
J. William Fulbright
The biggest lesson I learned from Vietnam is not to trust [our own] government statements.
J. William Fulbright
It's unnatural and unhealthy for a nation to be engaged in global crusades for some principle or idea while neglecting the needs of its own people.
J. William Fulbright
To give [the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba] even covert support is on a par with the hypocrisy and cynicism for which the United States is constantly denouncing the Soviet Union in the United Nations and elsewhere. This point will not be lost on the rest of the world, nor on our own consciences.
J. William Fulbright
