Presidents Say The Darnest Things

by President George W. Bush

"Rarely is the question asked: Is our children learning?" - Florence, South Carolina, 11 January 2000.

"I know how hard it is for you to put food on your family." - In Nashua, New Hampshire, 27 January 2000.

"Will the highways on the Internet become more few?" - In Concord, New Hampshire, 29 January 2000.

"If you're sick and tired of the politics of cynicism and polls and principles, come and join this campaign." - Hilton Head, South Carolina, 16 February 2000.

"The senator has got to understand if he's going to have-he can't have it both ways. He can't take the high horse and then claim the low road." - Florence, South Carolina, 17 February 2000.

"I understand small business growth. I was one." - New York Daily News, 19 February 2000.

"The fact that he relies on facts says things that are not factual are going to undermine his campaign." - New York Times, 4 March 2000

Bush: "First of all, Cinco de Mayo is not the independence day. That's dieciséis de Septiembre, and ..."
Matthews: "What's that in English?"
Bush: "Fifteenth of September." [Dieciséis de Septiembre = Sept. 16] - Hardball, MSNBC, 31 May 2000

"The fundamental question is, 'Will I be a successful president when it comes to foreign policy?' I will be, but until I'm the president, it's going to be hard for me to verify that I think I'll be more effective." - In Wayne, Mich., as quoted by Katharine Q. Seelye in the New York Times, 2 June 2000

"The only things that I can tell you is that every case I have reviewed I have been comfortable with the innocence or guilt of the person that I've looked at. I do not believe we've put a guilty... I mean innocent person to death in the state of Texas." - All Things Considered, NPR, 16 June 2000

"This case has had full analyzation and has been looked at a lot. I understand the emotionality of death penalty cases." - Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 23 June 2000

"States should have the right to enact reasonable laws and restrictions particularly to end the inhumane practice of ending a life that otherwise could live." - Cleveland, 29 June 2000

"Unfairly but truthfully, our party has been tagged as being against things. Anti-immigrant, for example. And we're not a party of anti-immigrants. Quite the opposite. We're a party that welcomes people." - Cleveland, 1 July 2000

"You might want to comment on that, Honorable." - To New Jersey's secretary of state, the Hon. DeForest Soaries Jr., as quoted by Dana Milbank in the Washington Post, 15 July 2000

"I regret that a private comment I made to the vice presidential candidate made it through the public airways." - Allentown, Pa. 5 September 2000

"The woman who knew that I had dyslexia... I never interviewed her." - Orange, California, 15 September 2000

"I am a person who recognizes the fallacy of humans." - Oprah, 19 September 2000

"It is clear our nation is reliant upon big foreign oil. More and more of our imports come from overseas." - Beaverton, Ore. 25 September 2000

"I will have a foreign-handed foreign policy." - Redwood, California, 27 September 2000

"I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully." - Saginaw, Mich. 29 Sept 2000

"I think if you know what you believe, it makes it a lot easier to answer questions. I can't answer your question." - In response to a question about whether he wished he could take back any of his answers in the first debate. Reynoldsburg, Ohio, 4 October 2000

"It's going to require numerous IRA agents." - On Gore's tax plan, Greensboro, N.C. 10 October 2000

"I mean, there needs to be a wholesale effort against racial profiling, which is illiterate children." - Second presidential debate, 11 October 2000

"If affirmative action means what I just described, what I'm for, then I'm for it." - St. Louis, Mo. 18 October 2000

"Quotas are bad for America. It's not the way America is all about." - St. Louis, Mo. 18 October 2000

"Mr. Vice President, in all due respect, it is... I'm not sure 80 percent of the people get the death tax. I know this: 100 percent will get it if I'm the president." - St. Louis, Mo. 18 October 2000

"I think we ought to raise the age at which juveniles can have a gun." - St. Louis, Mo. 18 October 2000

"It's one thing about insurance, that's a Washington term." - St. Louis, Mo. 18 October 2000

"Drug therapies are replacing a lot of medicines as we used to know it." - St. Louis, Mo. 18 October 2000

"If I'm the president, we're going to have emergency-room care, we're going to have gag orders." - St. Louis, Mo. 18 October 2000

"Families is where our nation finds hope, where wings take dream." - LaCrosse, Wis. 18 October 2000

"It's your money. You paid for it." - LaCrosse, Wis. 18 October 2000.

"That's a chapter, the last chapter of the 20th, 20th, the 21st century that most of us would rather forget. The last chapter of the 20th century. This is the first chapter of the 21st century." - On the Lewinsky scandal, Arlington Heights, Ill. 24 October 2000.

"It's important for us to explain to our nation that life is important. It's not only life of babies, but it's life of children living in, you know, the dark dungeons of the Internet." - Arlington Heights, Ill., 24 October 2000.

"Anyway, after we go out and work our hearts out, after you go out and help us turn out the vote, after we've convinced the good Americans to vote, and while they're at it, pull that old George W. lever, if I'm the one, when I put my hand on the Bible, when I put my hand on the Bible, that day when they swear us in, when I put my hand on the Bible, I will swear to not... to uphold the laws of the land." - Toledo, Ohio, 27 October 2000.

"They want the federal government controlling Social Security like it's some kind of federal program." - St. Charles, Mo. 2 November 2000

"One reason I like to highlight reading is, reading is the beginnings of the ability to be a good student. And if you can't read, it's going to be hard to realize dreams; it's going to be hard to go to college. So when your teachers say, read - you ought to listen to her." - Nalle Elementary School, Washington, D.C. 9 February 2001

"I am pleased to have the responsibility of being President of the United States. As young Americans you also have an important responsibility, which is to become good citizens." - In a letter to some 11 year old school children in Yorkshire, England (The Observer, 1 July 2001)

"Well, I think if you say you're going to do something and don't do it, that's trustworthiness." - Ibid

"This campaign not only hears the voices of the entrepreneurs and the farmers and the entrepreneurs, we hear the voices of those struggling to get ahead." - Ibid

"We cannot let terrorists and rogue nations hold this nation hostile or hold our allies hostile." - Ibid

"Actually, I... this may sound a little West Texan to you, but I like it. When I'm talking about... when I'm talking about myself, and when he's talking about myself, all of us are talking about me." - Ibid

"I think we agree, the past is over." - On his meeting with John McCain, Dallas Morning