If the President does it, it can't be illegal.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that actions taken by those in power may be seen as justified or beyond scrutiny.
Richard M. Nixon's quote reflects a controversial perspective on the nature of legality and morality in leadership. It implies that the authority of the President can exempt actions from being judged as illegal, challenging the principles of accountability and justice. This notion raises ethical questions about the role of power and the boundaries of legal actions in governance.
In practice
In a discussion about the importance of checks and balances within government systems.
The destiny of our land, the air we breathe, the water we drink is not in the mystical hands of an uncontrollable agent, it is in our hands. A future which brings the balancing of our resources-preserving quality with quantity - is a future limited only by the boundaries of our will to get the job done.
The recent upsurge of public concern over environmental questions reflects a belated recognition that man has been too cavalier in his relations with nature. Unless we arrest the depredations that have been inflicted so carelessly on our natural systems-which exist in an intricate set of balances-we face the prospect of ecological disaster.
The ability to be cool, confident, and decisive in crisis is not an inherited characteristic but is the direct result of how well the individual has prepared himself for the battle.
If you take no risks, you will suffer no defeats. But if you take no risks, you win no victories.
We cannot learn from one another until we stop shouting at one another - until we speak quietly enough so that our words can be heard as well as our voices.
Never has so much military and economic and diplomatic power been used so ineffectively, and if after all of this time, and all of this sacrifice, and all of this support, there is still no end in sight, then I say the time has come for the American people to turn to new leadership not tied to the mistakes and policies of the past.
I just have a sense that, you know, I'm curious about what is religion about, you know? Why do some of us still engage it? It's not because it's a set of old beliefs or old ideas. Or even, particularly, the view that this is the only true religion. Many of us no longer accept those views.
Where is the soul? . . . I refuse to believe anything of that kind without proof. The idea that, as soon as a man's breath leaves his body, the soul flops out like a chicken's head and flies off into space to find a lodgment where there [are] harps and haloes. Too much for me.
To believe that will has power over potentiality, that the passage to actuality is the result of a decision that puts an end to the ambiguity of potentiality (which is always potentiality to do and not to do) β this is the perpetual illusion of morality.
When you are in anger, in passion, violent, aggressive, you feel a crystallized ego within you. Whenever you are in love, in compassion, it is not there.
We are all brothers and we are all suffering the same fate. The same smoke floats over all our heads. Help one another. It is the only way to survive. (pg. 39)
Wonder is the foundation of all philosophy, inquiry the progress, ignorance the end.
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