McGeorge Bundy famous quotes

Last updated: Sep 5, 2024

Although war is evil, it is occasionally the lesser of two evils.
-- McGeorge Bundy

#War #Two #Evil
Well, it is alarming to have a president [Reagan] who doesn't know what he is doing.
-- McGeorge Bundy

#President #Wells #American Politics
The most persistent of all attractive illusions in our country may be that racism can be ended by one single blow.
-- McGeorge Bundy

#Country #Blow #Racism
It was obvious uh, that uh, the situation in Vietnam was far from stable in 1964 and that there, if in fact the United States was going to uh carry out its declared intent to uh, do its best to prevent uh, a Communist overrun of South Vietnam, uh, there would be at least hard choices to make, and there might be a choice for uh, stronger action.
-- McGeorge Bundy

#Choices #Stronger #United States
Vietnam, really more accurately, Laos, was almost after Berlin the top problem at the beginning of the Kennedy Administration in '61, foreign problem.
-- McGeorge Bundy

#Laos #Vietnam #Berlin
There is nearly always uh, a process of wanting contingency plans made in the military.
-- McGeorge Bundy

#Military #Made #Process
Presidents and Lyndon Johnson was really no exception, very rapidly learned the difference between a contingency plan and an authorized act.
-- McGeorge Bundy

#Differences #President #Johnson

All my life I've been aware of the Second World War humming in the background. I was born 10 years after it was finished, and without ever seeing it. It formed my generation and the world we lived in. I played Hurricanes and Spitfires in the playground, and war films still form the basis of all my moral philosophy. All the men I've ever got to my feet for or called sir had been in the war.
There are two ways of getting out of a trial. One is simply to try to get rid of the trial, and be thankful when it is over. The other is to recognize the trial as a challenge from God to claim a larger blessing than we have ever had, and to hail it with delight as an opportunity of obtaining a larger measure of divine grace.
Back in the days when American billboard advertising was in flower [said Hemingway], there were two slogans that I always rated above all others: the old Cremo Cigar ad that proclaimed, Spit Is a Horrid Word-but Worse on the end of Your Cigar, and Drink Schlitz in Brown Bottles and Avoid that Skunk Taste. You don't get creative writing like that any more.
Plant trees. They give us two of the most crucial elements for our survival: oxygen and books.
Any time you get two people in a room who disagree about anything, the time of day, there is a scene to be written. That's what I look for.
The beneficial effect of state intervention, especially in the form of legislation, is direct, immediate, and so to speak, visible, while its evil effects are gradual and indirect and lay out of sight ... Hence the majority of mankind must almost of necessity look with undue favor upon governmental intervention.
There is evil in the world, but it can be overcome through repentance Âand aspiration, and therein lies the true meaning and adventure of life.
I love the saliheen (pious people) even though Iâ€™m not one of them, and I hate the taliheen (evil people) even though I (may be) worse than them.
...morally speaking, there is no limit to the concern one must feel for the suffering of human beings, that indifference to evil is worse than evil itself, that in a free society, some are guilty, but all are responsible.
There are few things wholly evil or wholly good. Almost everything, especially of government policy, is an inseparable compound of the two, so that our best judgment of the preponderance between them is continually demanded.

McGeorge Bundy famous quotes

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