Explore Quotes by George H. W. Bush

We consider it vital that the community of nations be drawn together in an orderly, disciplined, rational way to review the history of our global environment, to assess the potential for future climate change, and to develop effective programs.

The United States will continue its efforts to improve our understanding of climate change - to seek hard data, accurate models, and new ways to improve the science - and determine how best to meet these tremendous challenges.

People must be free to work, to save, to own their own home, to take risks, to invest in each other and, in essence, to control their own lives.

People say I'm indecisive, but I don't know about that.

Abraham Lincoln truly inspired me. It wasn’t just the freeing of the slaves, he kept the Union together. Some people even forget that today. What I think inspired me was the fact that in spite of being the president of the United States he retained a certain down-to-earth quality. He never got to be a big shot, and he cared about people.

If I were to give advice to young people, high-achieving young people for example, I’d have to say, don’t neglect your family. Politics is important, sitting at the head table is glamorous. Traveling around the world, trying to do something for world peace was wonderful. But family and friends and faith are what really matter in life. And I know that. I see it so clearly now.

The world can therefore seize the opportunity (the Persian Gulf crisis) to fulfill the long held promise of a New World Order where diverse nations are drawn together in common cause to achieve the universal aspirations of mankind.

Out of these troubled times, our fifth objective - a New World Order - can emerge. . . Now, we can see a New World Order coming into view. A world in which there is a very real prospect for a New World Order. . .A world where the United Nations, freed from a Cold War stalemate, is poised to fulfill the historic vision of its founders.

The rigidity of those pledges is something I don’t like. The circumstances change and you can’t be wedded to some formula by Grover Norquist. It’s—who the hell is Grover Norquist, anyway?

We also share a profound desire for a lasting peace in the Middle East. My Administration is dedicated to achieving this goal, one which will guarantee Israel security. At the same time, we will do our utmost to defend and protect Israel, for unless Israel is strong and secure, then peace will always be beyond our grasp. We were with Israel at the beginning, 41 years ago. We are with Israel today. And we will be with Israel in the future. No one should doubt this basic committment.

The Congress will push me to raise taxes, and I'll say no, and they'll push, and I'll say no, and they'll push again and I'll say to them, read my lips, no new taxes.

I'm President of the United States, and I'm not going to eat any more broccoli!

My vision of a 'new world order' foresees a United Nations with a revitalized peacekeeping function.

We have before us the opportunity to forge for ourselves and for future generations a new world order, a world where the rule of law, not the law of the jungle, governs the conduct of nations. When we are successful, and we will be, we have a real chance at this new world order, an order in which a credible United Nations can use its peacekeeping role to fulfill the promise and vision of the U.N.'s founders.

Time and again in this century, the political map of the world was transformed. And ineach instance a new world order came about through the advent of a new tyrant or the outbreak of a bloody global war, or its end.

The world also remains a hopeful place. Calls for democracy and human rights are being reborn everywhere, and these calls are an expression of support for the values enshrined in the United Nations Charter. They encourage our hopes for a more stable, more peaceful, more prosperous world.

Any definition of a successful life must include service to others.

If the American people knew what we have done, they would string us up from the lamp posts.

We're going to keep trying to strengthen the American family, to make them more like the Waltons and less like the Simpsons.

Appeasement does not work. As was the case in the 1930s, we see in Saddam Hussein an aggressive dictator threatening his neighbors.

Going in and occupying Iraq, thus unilaterally exceeding the United Nations' mandate, would have destroyed the precedent of international response to aggression that we hoped to establish. Had we gone the invasion route, the United States could conceivably still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land.