An American Pilgrimage Quotes

There are some of us who have to pay for our faith every step of the way and who have to work out dramatically what it would be like without it and if being without it would be ultimately possible or not. ~ Flannery O'Connor

I think that for a lot of actors - especially American actors - to get line readings and to be told and have your director literally act out the part for you is sort of discouraging in a way. It's a very Eastern European thing to do - a lot of directors that I worked with in Russia did that as well. And, I never took that as an insult, as many actors tend to do. To me, I think it's just offering a certain energy - offering their flavor - and, instead of trying to sort of decode and communicate it to you, they just show you their flavor of what it should be. ~ Jon Bernthal

In the American political system, you're only allowed to have real ideas if it's absolutely guaranteed that you can't win an election ~ P. J. O'Rourke

We don't need more politicians insisting we have deficits because you're not taxed enough. Those deficits ballooned from an economy that didn't grow enough and from 50 years of government spending too much. ~ Ronald Reagan

'Boomerang!' I love that movie just because of Halle Berry, Robin Givens, Eddie Murphy, Grace Jones and Eartha Kitt. There were so many characters. As an actress, to see African-American actors be so diverse was different from what I was used to seeing. ~ Drew Sidora

The general burden of the Coolidge memoirs was that the right hon. gentleman was a typical American, and some hinted that he was the most typical since Lincoln. As the English say, I find myself quite unable to associate myself with that thesis. He was, in truth, almost as unlike the average of his countrymen as if he had been born green. The Americano is an expansive fellow, a back-slapper, full of amiability; Coolidge was reserved and even muriatic. The Americano has a stupendous capacity for believing, and especially for believing in what is palpably not true; Coolidge was, in his fundamental metaphysics, an agnostic. The Americano dreams vast dreams, and is hag-ridden by a demon; Coolidge was not mount but rider, and his steed was a mechanical horse. The Americano, in his normal incarnation, challenges fate at every step and his whole life is a struggle; Coolidge took things as they came. ~ H.L. Mencken

Yoga class is intimate even just from the standpoint of taking off your socks. Exposing your bare feet can be a big deal. You may be an African American next to a Caucasian or a Latino. But once practice begins and we drop in, separation dissolves. ~ James Fox

But I must own that I also felt stirred by an unselfish desire to voice all the joys and sorrows, the hopes and ambitions, of the American Negro, in classic musical form. ~ James Weldon Johnson

Hispanic and African American neighborhoods had been targeted by the subprime lending industry: renters were lured into buying bad mortgages, and homeowners were encouraged to refinance under riskier terms. Then it all came crashing down. Between 2007 and 2010, the average white family experienced an 11 percent reduction in wealth, but the average black family lost 31 percent of its wealth. The average Hispanic family lost 44 percent. ~ Matthew Desmond

The playing field isn't level, and the people at the top often don't notice that. Perspective matters - it matters. Because a multi-millionaire can say to himself, 'I give away money to the poor, and I've never shoved a poor person in line' (if rich people ever actually stand in lines) - 'so I'm a good guy.' And therein lies the danger. The 'I'm a good guy' standard doesn't work. Sure, there are rich people who use their money for good causes that do nothing to advance their own financial interests. But when people with money use their money to get more money, they aren't evil, they're just acting rationally. And they're also acting rationally in the narrowest sense of that word when they use that money to buy favors from the government. But when they buy favors from the government, they are taking something that belongs to the rest of us. And when enough rich people or rich corporations buy enough favors, the whole economic and political system starts to tilt their way.

And if the American people allow this to go on long enough, there will come a point when the rich and powerful will be using so much of their money to buy so much influence over our government, that it will unwind the whole premise of democracy.

Instead of one person, one vote - giving each of us a say in how this country is run - we will become an oligarchy, a nation in which the powerful few make sure that the government runs in order to serve their interests. ~ Elizabeth Warren

Well, what I will tell you is the support from the world - it's not just an African-American citizen. There are people of all different walks of life who are rallying behind the concerns with the that Sandy was treated because what that says to me is that this is an American issue. ~ Sharon Cooper

I think that our future has lost that capital F we used to spell it with. The science fiction future of my childhood has had a capital F - it was assumed to be an American Future because America was the future. The Future was assumed to be inherently heroic, and a lot of other things, as well. ~ William Gibson

Although the Civil War was an apocalyptic success in the sense that it brought an end to nearly a century of struggle and broken hopes regarding the ultimate extinction of African American slavery, it also combined new freedoms, as in other major revolutions, with shock, breakdown, trauma, and tragedy. Neither desired nor accurately anticipated by leaders in the North and South, the war dramatized the failure of the whole American system of political negotiation and compromise that had never weakened the institution of slavery but had supported democratic government for whites for over eighty years. < ... > Moreover, the long-term outcome of this revolutionary decision would be determined within a context of sectional hate and bitterness, political revenge, and competing presssures for reconciliation, reunion, and forgiveness. ~ David Brion Davis

I'm an artist - not a 'woman artist' not an 'American artist.'"8 ~ Gail Levin

The American experiment is not a theocracy and does not establish an official religion, but the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States are rooted in a Christian perspective of the nature of government and the nature of man. The challenge of the next millennium will be to preserve the American experiment by restoring its Christian perspective. ~ William H. Pryor, Jr.

Regardless if a person likes my book I've earned the title: An American Writer. ~ Jonathan Heatt

As an American, and especially as a Christian, I am convinced that a love for our own people is not a bad thing, but love doesn't stop at borders. Love is infinitely boundless and all about holy trespassing and offensive friendships. ~ Shane Claiborne

It's funny, because I've never thought of myself as a Hispanic actor, like in 'American Gangster,' I'm playing an Italian. I've always been fortunate enough to have been allowed to play all these diverse roles. ~ Yul Vazquez

Sharia has become an increasingly significant force in American capitalism, thanks to the embrace by Wall Street and the U.S. government of so-called Sharia-Compliant Finance. Indeed, this country's taxpayers now own the largest purveyor of sharia-compliant insurance products in the world: AIG. ~ Frank Gaffney

Swearing on the Bible, you understand that shit? They tell you to raise your right hand and put your left hand on the Bible. Does this stuff really matter, which hand? Does God really give a fuck about details like this? Suppose you put your right hand on the Bible and you raise your left hand. Would that count? Or would God say, 'Sorry, wrong hand, try again'? And why does one hand have to be raised? [...] But let's get back to the Bible, America's favorite national theatrical prop.

Suppose the Bible they hand you to swear on is upside down, or backward, or both, and you swear to tell the truth on an upside-down backward Bible. Would that count? Suppose the Bible they hand you is an old Bible and half the pages are missing. Suppose all they have is a Chinese Bible. In an American court. Or a Braille Bible, and you're not blind. Suppose they hand you an upside-down, backward, Chinese, Braille Bible with half the pages missing. At what point does all of this stuff just break down and become just a lot of stupid shit that somebody made up? They fuckin' made it up, folks, it's make-believe! It's make-believe [...] Bible or no Bible, God or no God, if it suits their purposes, people are going to lie in court. ~ George Carlin

My main goal is to be the No. 1 American and the No. 1 player in the world. If an American is on top of the leader board every week, it will bring more people into the game of golf. ~ Paula Creamer

American racism has many moving parts, and has had enough centuries in which to evolve an impressive camouflage. It can hoard its malice in great stillness for a long time, all the while pretending to look the other way. Like misogyny, it is atmospheric. You don't see it at first. But understanding comes. ~ Teju Cole

I was an 18-year-old kid, and I was in the heart of things in Washington. My interest in American politics and, particularly, the Kennedys, began then. ~ Nigel Hamilton

The American character looks always as if it had just had a rather bad haircut, which gives it, in our eyes at any rate, a greater humanity than the European, which even among its beggars has an all too professional air. ~ Mary McCarthy

I feel like a Mac store! I have a Canadian iPhone, an American iPhone and an iPad. I'm constantly downloading music to iTunes. ~ Jennifer Morrison

The American house has been TV-centered for three generations. It is the focus of family life, and the life of the house correspondingly turns inward, away from whatever corresponds beyond its four walls.At the same time, the television if the families chief connection to the world. The physical envelope of the house itself no longer connects their lives to the outside in any active way; rather it seals them from it.The outside world has become an abstraction filtered through television, just as the weather is an abstraction filtered through air conditioning. ~ James Howard Kunstler

Embracing amnesty and open borders. Sure, other countries have borders (the ones most people are fleeing from), but discussing the possibility of an American border is smeared as racist - the ~ Greg Gutfeld

We owe an enormous debt of gratitude to those who serve or have served in our country's military, as well as to the families of those individuals. Whether protecting our freedoms in foreign fields or making contributions here at home, the value these men and women bring to the American workforce and our way of life is beyond measure. ~ Sylvia Mathews Burwell

I woke up one day and realized I could never be an American. ~ Helen Mirren

'The Price Is Right,' it was an honor to be offered it because it's such an American institution. To be able to carry on this tradition with a show that has been on for so long, I thought it was a great opportunity for me. ~ Drew Carey

The eyes of all people are upon us. And all they see is a mash-up of naked prisoners and an American girl in fatigues standing there giving a thumbs-up. As I write this, the United States of America is still a city on a hill; and it's still shining - because we never turn off the lights in our torture prisons. That's how we carry out the sleep deprivation. ~ Sarah Vowell

Today Prince William went to Washington, D.C., and he met with President Obama. He said, 'It feels weird being in the White House because I'm not an American.' And then Prince William said, 'Yeah, me too.' ~ Craig Ferguson