A Little Oxford Dictionary of Humorous Quotations

It’s a pity, as my husband says, that more politicians are not bastards by birth instead of vocation.

Katharine Whitehorn 1928– English journalist

Politics

see alsoDEMOCRACY, DIPLOMACY, GOVERNMENT

Politics is the gentle art of getting votes from the poor and campaign funds from the rich by promising to protect each from the other.

Oscar Ameringer 1870–1943 American humorist

Vote for the man who promises least; he’ll be the least disappointing.

Bernard Baruch 1870–1965 American financier and presidential adviser

Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it wrongly and applying unsuitable remedies.

Ernest Benn 1875–1954 English publisher

There are two ways of getting into the Cabinet—you can crawl in or kick your way in.

Aneurin Bevan 1897–1960 British Labour politician

The liberals can understand everything but people who don’t understand them.

Lenny Bruce 1925–66 American comedian

Have you ever seen a candidate talking to a rich person on television?

Art Buchwald 1925–2007 American humorist

Dear Chief Secretary, I’m afraid there is no money.

Liam Byrne 1970– British Labour politician

to Franklin Roosevelt on the likely duration of the Yalta conference:

I do not see any other way of realizing our hopes about World Organization in five or six days. Even the Almighty took seven.

Winston Churchill 1874–1965 British Conservative statesman

There are no true friends in politics. We are all sharks circling, and waiting, for traces of blood to appear in the water.

Alan Clark 1928–99 British Conservative politician

on being attacked by Egyptian protesters:

I felt bad that good tomatoes were wasted.

Hillary Rodham Clinton 1947– American lawyer and politician

on Mussolini’s allowing himself to be photographed in a bathing suit:

A really great statesman doesn’t do that.

Adolf Hitler 1889–1945 German dictator

My policy on cake is still pro having it and pro eating it!

Boris Johnson 1964– British Conservative politician

Politics is just show business for ugly people.

Jay Leno 1950– American comedian

If voting changed anything they’d abolish it.

Ken Livingstone 1945– British Labour politician

If you want to succeed in politics, you must keep your conscience well under control.

David Lloyd George 1863–1945 British Liberal statesman

Being in politics is like being a football coach. You have to be smart enough to understand the game, and dumb enough to think it’s important.

Eugene McCarthy 1916–2005 American Democratic politician

I have never found in a long experience of politics that criticism is ever inhibited by ignorance.

Harold Macmillan 1894–1986 British Conservative statesman

on privatization:

First of all the Georgian silver goes, and then all that nice furniture that used to be in the saloon. Then the Canalettos go.

Harold Macmillan 1894–1986 British Conservative statesman

WOMAN HECKLER: I wouldn’t vote for you if you were the Archangel Gabriel.

MENZIES: If I were the Archangel Gabriel, madam, I’m afraid you would not be in my constituency.

Robert Gordon Menzies 1894–1978 Australian Liberal statesman

When I want a peerage, I shall buy it like an honest man.

Lord Northcliffe 1865–1922 British newspaper proprietor

Men enter local politics solely as a result of being unhappily married.

C. Northcote Parkinson 1909–93 English writer

Politics is supposed to be the second oldest profession. I have come to realize that it bears a very close resemblance to the first.

Ronald Reagan 1911–2004 American Republican statesman

Status quo, you know, that is Latin for ‘the mess we’re in’.

Ronald Reagan 1911–2004 American Republican statesman

Communism is like prohibition, it’s a good idea but it won’t work.

Will Rogers 1879–1935 American actor and humorist

He knows nothing; and he thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career.

George Bernard Shaw 1856–1950 Irish dramatist

An independent is a guy who wants to take the politics out of politics.

Adlai Stevenson 1900–65 American Democratic politician

WOMAN AT A RALLY: Governor, every thinking person will be voting for you.

STEVENSON: Madam, that’s not enough. I need a majority.

Adlai Stevenson 1900–65 American Democratic politician

I always cheer up immensely if an attack is particularly wounding because I think, well, if they attack me personally, it means they have not a single political argument left.