Let me tell you something that we Israelis have against Moses. He took us 40 years through the desert in order to bring us to the one spot in the Middle East that has no oil!
Golda MeirRead
The Soviet government is the most realistic regime in the world - no ideals.
Interpretation
Golda Meir highlights the practical nature of the Soviet government, emphasizing its lack of idealism.
In this quote, Golda Meir points out that the Soviet government operates on a basis of stark realism, devoid of the lofty ideals that often characterize other political systems. This perspective suggests a focus on pragmatic governance and a recognition of the harsh realities of political power, implying that the absence of ideals can lead to a certain authenticity in governance, albeit one that may be morally questionable.
In practice
In a discussion about political systems during a debate, one might quote Meir to emphasize the importance of realism.
Let me tell you something that we Israelis have against Moses. He took us 40 years through the desert in order to bring us to the one spot in the Middle East that has no oil!
We don't thrive on military acts. We do them because we have to, and thank God we are efficient.
It isn't really important to decide when you are very young just exactly what you want to become when you grow up. It is much more important to decide on the way you want to live. If you are going to be honest with yourself and honest with your friends, if you are going to get involved in causes which are good for others, not only for yourselves, then it seems to me that that is sufficient, and maybe what you will be is only a matter of chance.
It is true we have won all our wars, but we have paid for them. We don't want victories anymore.
It's no accident many accuse me of conducting public affairs with my heart instead of my head. Well, what if I do?.. Those who don't know how to weep with their whole heart don't know how to laugh either.
Trust yourself. Create the kind of self that you will be happy to live with all your life.
The United States is just now the oldest country in the world, there always is an oldest country and she is it, it is she who is the mother of the twentieth century civilization. She began to feel herself as it just after the Civil War. And so it is a country the right age to have been born in and the wrong age to live in.
[I]n the American soul there is a lonely individual standing in a vast landscape. He is either on a horse or driving a car, depending, and either way he’s carrying a gun. This is one of the essential images in American mythology.
Whether wine is a nourishment, medicine or poison is a matter of dosage
When there’s something in the Word of God that I don’t like, the problem is not with the Word of God, it’s with me.
This you may say of man - when theories change and crash, when schools, philosophies, when narrow dark alleys of thought, national, religious, economic, grow and disintegrate, man reaches, stumbles forward, painfully, mistakenly sometimes. Having stepped forward, he may slip back, but only half a step, never the full step back.
Your Honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with all living beings, and I made up my mind that I was not one bit better than the meanest on earth. I said then, and I say now, that while there is a lower class, I am in it, and while there is a criminal element I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.
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