Jimmy Carter

There's always an element of self delusion among people who believe they ought to be President. There's an underestimation of your opponent and an overestimation of your own abilities. This is compatible with being rich and powerful, the idea that we were blessed by God because we deserve to be blessed.

Sadat was a great and good man, and his most bitter and dangerous enemies were people who were obsessed with hatred for his peaceful goals.

I don't think that the total creation took place in six days as we now measure time. If we can confirm, say, the Big Bang theory, that doesn't at all cause me to question my faith that God created the Big Bang.

It's very difficult for the American people to believe that our government, one of the richest on Earth, is also one of the stingiest on Earth.

I think there ought to be a strict separation or wall built between our religious faith and our practice of political authority in office. I don't think the President of the United States should extoll Christianity if he happens to be a Christian at the expense of Judaism, Islam or other faiths.

It's not necessary to fear the prospect of failure but to be determined not to fail.

It is good to realize that if love and peace can prevail on earth, and if we can teach our children to honor nature's gifts, the joys and beauties of the outdoors will be here forever.

We cannot be both the world's leading champion of peace and the world's leading supplier of the weapons of war.

I thought then and I think now that the invasion of Iraq was unnecessary and unjust and I think the premises on which it was launched were false.

I hate to see complacency prevail in our lives when it's so directly contrary to the teaching of Christ.

Human rights is the soul of our foreign policy, because human rights is the very soul of our sense of nationhood.

A fundamentalist can't bring himself or herself to negotiate with people who disagree with them because the negotiating process itself is an indication of implied equality.

If you fear making anyone mad, then you ultimately probe for the lowest common denominator of human achievement.

We have a tendency to condemn people who are different from us, to define their sins as paramount and our own sinfulness as being insignificant.

We should live our lives as though Christ were coming this afternoon.

Jesus never said a word about homosexuality. In all of his teachings about multiple things - he never said that gay people should be condemned. I personally think it is very fine for gay people to be married in civil ceremonies.

When people are intimidated about having their own opinions, oppression is at hand.

Failure is a reality; we all fail at times, and it's painful when we do. But it's better to fail while striving for something wonderful, challenging, adventurous, and uncertain than to say, " I don't want to try because I may not succeed completely.

Earlier in my life I thought the things that mattered were the things that you could see, like your car, your house, your wealth, your property, your office. But as I've grown older I've become convinced that the things that matter most are the things that you can't see -- the love you share with others, your inner purpose, your comfort with who you are.

I think as far as the adverse impact on the nation around the world, this administration has been the worst in history... The overt reversal of America's basic values as expressed by previous administrations, including those of George H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon and others, has been the most disturbing to me.