“Democracy triumphed in the cold war because it was a battle of values—between one system that gave preeminence to the state and another that gave preeminence to the individual and freedom. Not long ago, I was told about an incident that illustrated this difference: An American scholar, on his way to the airport before a flight to the Soviet Union, got into a conversation with his cab driver, a young man who said that he was still getting his education. The scholar asked, “When you finish your schooling, what do you want to be, what do you want to do?” The young man answered, “I haven’t decided yet.” After the scholar arrived at the airport in Moscow, his cab driver was also a young man who happened to mention he was still getting his education, and the scholar, who spoke Russian, asked, “When you finish your schooling, what do you want to be, what do you want to do?” The young man answered: “They haven’t told me yet.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“Here’s my strategy on the Cold War: We win, they lose.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“I didn’t leave the Democratic party, the Democratic Party left me.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“I occasionally think how quickly our differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien threat from outside this world.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“Entrepreneurs and their small enterprises are responsible for almost all the economic growth in the United States.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“Of all the millions of refugees we’ve seen in the modern world, their flight is always away from, not toward, the Communist world.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“I was not a great communicator, but I communicated great things.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“I discovered that night (in his college's student politics) that an audience has a feel to it, and, in the parlance of the theater, that audience and I were together.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“All great change in America begins at the dinner table.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“I thanked Nancy for what she had accomplished in her war against illegal drugs, but in my heart, I was really trying to say, “Thank you, Nancy, for everything; thank you for lighting up my life for almost forty years.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“If politics were a musical, it would be "Promises, Promises"
―
Ronald Reagan
“History is made by men and women of vision and courage. Tonight freedom is on the march.”
―
Ronald Reagan
