“Liberty has never come from government,” Woodrow Wilson, one of FDR’s predecessors and another Democrat, said. “The history of liberty is the history of limitation of government’s power, not the increase of it.” Somewhere along the line, the liberal Democrats forgot this and changed their party. It was no longer the party of Thomas Jefferson or Woodrow Wilson. The competitive free enterprise system has given us the greatest standard of living in the world, produced generation after generation of technical wizards who consistently lead the world in invention and innovation, and has provided unlimited opportunities enabling industrious Americans from the most humble of backgrounds to climb to the top of the ladder of success. By 1960, I realized the real enemy wasn’t big business, it was big government.
―
Ronald Reagan
“The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they’re ignorant. It’s just that they know so much that isn’t so.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“Sometimes when I'm faced with an atheist, I am tempted to invite him to the greatest gourmet dinner that one could ever serve, and when we have finished eating that magnificent dinner, to ask him if he believes there's a cook.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“Just think how happy you'd be if you lost everything you have right now & then got it back.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“Freedom is one of the deepest and noblest aspirations of the human spirit.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“Our government needs the church, because only those humble enough to admit they're sinners can bring democracy the tolerance it requires to survive”
―
Ronald Reagan
“They don't subscribe to our sense of morality; they don't believe in an afterlife; they don't believe in a God or religion. And the only morality they recognize, therefore, is what will advance the cause or socialism.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“Welfare's purpose should be to eliminate, as far as possible, the need for its own existence.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“I am not going to exploit for political purposes my opponent’s youth and inexperience.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“Later, several members of the Communist Party in Hollywood who had been involved in the attempted takeover went public and described in intimate detail how Moscow was trying to take over the picture business.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“Democracy is worth dying for, because it's the most deeply honorable form of government ever devised by man.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“I'm a gooey, gushy gumdrop bullshitty drop bombs on Russia! ride a horse ...”
―
Ronald Reagan
“The federal government did not create the states; the states created the federal government.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“I’d learned a few lessons about negotiating: You’re unlikely to ever get all you want; you’ll probably get more of what you want if you don’t issue ultimatums and leave your adversary room to maneuver; you shouldn’t back your adversary into a corner, embarrass him, or humiliate him; and sometimes the easiest way to get some things done is for the top people to do them alone and in private.”
―
Ronald Reagan
“The best minds are not in government. If any were, business would steal them away.”
―
Ronald Reagan
