“Those who foolishly sought power by riding the back of the tiger ended up inside”
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John F. Kennedy
“We have the power to make this the best generation of mankind in the history of the world or to make it the last.”
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John F. Kennedy
“We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people."
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John F. Kennedy
“For, in the final analysis, our most common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future. And we are all mortal.”
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John F. Kennedy
“Great crisis produce great men and great deeds of courage.”
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John F. Kennedy
“When written in Chinese, the word "crisis" is composed of two characters. One represents danger and the other represents opportunity.”
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John F. Kennedy
“The very word 'secrecy' is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths, and to secret proceedings”
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John F. Kennedy
“The courage of life is often a less dramatic spectacle than the courage of a final moment; but it is no less a magnificent mixture of triumph and tragedy. A man does what he must - in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles and dangers and pressures - and that is the basis of all morality.”
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John F. Kennedy
“I believe in human dignity as the source of national purpose, in human liberty as the source of national action, in the human heart as the source of national compassion... for liberalism is not so much a party creed as it is an attitude of mind and heart, a faith in man's ability through the experiences of his reason and judgment to increase for himself and his fellow men the amount of justice and freedom and brotherhood which all human life deserves.”
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John F. Kennedy
“What makes journalist so fascinating, and biography so interesting [is] the struggle to answer that single question: 'What's he like?”
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John F. Kennedy
“No American is ever made better off by pulling a fellow American down, and all of us are made better off whenever any one of us is made better off.”
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John F. Kennedy
“Too often we enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.”
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John F. Kennedy
“Now the trumpet summons us again—not as a call to bear arms, though arms we need; not as a call to battle, though embattled we are—but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle, year in and year out, "rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation"—a struggle against the common enemies of man: tyranny, poverty, disease, and war itself.
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John F. Kennedy