John Avlon Quotes

8 Sourced Quotes

Politics follows the lines of physics: every action creates an equal and opposite reaction.

John Avlon
Godwin's law states that the longer any online debate goes on, the likelier it is that someone will play the Nazi card. It's the rhetorical equivalent of going nuclear and stupid at the same time.

John Avlon
Terrorism is always one bad day away from being issue No. 1.

John Avlon
Extremes are ultimately their own side's worst enemy.

John Avlon
If you only take offense when the president of your party is compared to Hitler, then you're part of the problem.

John Avlon
Professional partisans are still playing politics by industrial-age rules. They haven't woken up to the information-age reality. Younger generations have grown up with a multiplicity of choice on every front, which can be tailored to suit their individual beliefs. Politics is the last place where we are supposed to be satisfied with a choice between Brand A and Brand B.

John Avlon
We cannot hope to change human nature. There will always be cranks and conspiracy theorists among us. But we can try to improve things - we don't have to accept the debasement of civil discourse or civic decline. We can take steps to ensure that the lunatic fringe remains on the fringe and stops bleeding into the base and then poisoning the mainstream

John Avlon
But in his Farewell Address, George Washington made it clear that he perceived no greater threat to the American experiment than a partisan demagogue who 'agitates the community with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms, kindles the animosity of one part against the other'

John Avlon