Molly Ivins Quotes

78 Sourced Quotes

The trouble with blaming powerless people is that although it's not nearly as scary as blaming the powerful, it does miss the point. Poor people do not shut down factories... Poor people didn't decide to use 'contract employees' because they cost less and don't get any benefits.

Molly Ivins
The impulse to make ourselves safer by making ourselves less free is an old one... When we are badly frightened, we think we can make ourselves safer by sacrificing some of our liberties. We did it during the McCarthy era out of fear of communism. Less liberty is regularly proposed as a solution to crime, to pornography, to illegal immigration, to abortion, to all kinds of threats.

Molly Ivins
I assume we can defeat Hussein without great cost to our side (God forgive me if that is hubris). The problem is what happens after we win. The country is 20 percent Kurd, 20 percent Sunni and 60 percent Shiite. Can you say, 'Horrible three-way civil war?'

Molly Ivins
Humanism is not alive and well in Texas. Different colors and types of Texans do not like one another, nor do they pretend to.

Molly Ivins
As for George Bush of Kennebunkport, Maine- personally I think he's further evidence that the Great Scriptwriter in the Sky has an overdeveloped sense of irony.

Molly Ivins
I often plagiarize from myself. I like to think of this as ecological journalism: I recycle.

Molly Ivins
I believe politics is the finest form of entertainment in the state of Texas: better than the zoo, better than the circus, rougher than football, and even more aesthetically satisfying than baseball. Becoming a fan of this arcane art form will yield a body endless joy—besides, they make you pay for it whether you pay attention or not.

Molly Ivins
You could probably prove, by judicious use of logarithms and congruent triangles, that real life is a lot more like soap opera than most people will admit.

Molly Ivins
On Bill Clinton: "If left to my own devices, I'd spend all my time pointing out that he's weaker than bus-station chili. But the man is so constantly subjected to such hideous and unfair abuse that I wind up standing up for him on the general principle that some fairness should be applied. Besides, no one but a fool or a Republican ever took him for a liberal."

Molly Ivins
California is now close to spending more on prisons than it does on higher education — surely the death warrant of a civilization.

Molly Ivins
Prayer in school is quite perfectly legal, and is especially common before algebra exams. Mandatory prayer organized by, led by and broadcast over the public address system by paid agents of the state is unconstitutional.

Molly Ivins
The more a body tries to explode all the foolish myths that have grown up about Texas by telling the truth, the more a body will wind up adding to the mythology.

Molly Ivins
My fellow citizens, we live in a great nation. Its occasional resemblance to a lunatic asylum is purely coincidental and doubtlessly not the intention of the author of us all.

Molly Ivins
I always thought the world was divided into only two kinds of people — those who think the world is divided into two kinds of people, and those who don't.

Molly Ivins
Nothing like a few restful weeks contemplating the decline of civilization to restore the humors. What I did on my summer vacation was listen to a lot of people talk about the decline of practically everything — you could call it the leisure of the theory class.

Molly Ivins
Nice is a pallid virtue. Not like honesty or courage or perseverance. On the other hand, in a nation notably lacking in civility, there is much to be said for nice.

Molly Ivins
I still believe in Hope - mostly because there's no such place as Fingers Crossed, Arkansas.

Molly Ivins
It is quite reasonable to subscribe both to the old saw that no good girl was ever ruined by a book and to the perception that it is not good for children to be constantly exposed to the sexual violence in our popular culture. Protecting children seems to me logically, legally, and rather easily differentiated from censorship.

Molly Ivins
Young political reporters are always told there are three ways to judge a politician. The first is to look at the record. The second is to look at the record. And third, look at the record.

Molly Ivins
Thou shalt not break the law with impunity, no matter who the hell thou art.

Molly Ivins
The purpose of journalism is to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable.

Molly Ivins
I'm sorry that government involves filling out a lot of forms.... I'm sorry myself that we're not still on the frontier, where we could all tote guns, shoot anything that moved and spit to our hearts' content. But we live in a diverse and crowded country, and with civilization comes regulation.

Molly Ivins
I have been attacked by Rush Limbaugh on the air, an experience somewhat akin to being gummed by a newt. It doesn't actually hurt, but it leaves you with slimy stuff on your ankle.

Molly Ivins
Whatever you do, don't give up. Because all you can do once you've given up is bitch. I've known some great bitchers in my time. With some it's a passion, with others an art.

Molly Ivins
Havin' fun while freedom fightin' must be one of those lunatic Texas traits we get from the water - which is known to have lithium in it - because it goes all the way back to Sam Houston, surely the most lovable, the most human, and the funniest of all the great men this country has ever produced.

Molly Ivins
When politicians start talking about large groups of their fellow Americans as 'enemies,' it's time for a quiet stir of alertness. Polarizing people is a good way to win an election, and also a good way to wreck a country.

Molly Ivins
It's all very well to run around saying regulation is bad, get the government off our backs, etc. Of course our lives are regulated. When you come to a stop sign, you stop; if you want to go fishing, you get a license; if you want to shoot ducks, you can shoot only three ducks. The alternative is dead bodies at the intersection, no fish, and no ducks. OK?

Molly Ivins
Politics in this country isn't about left and right; it's about up and down. The few are screwing the many.

Molly Ivins
Texas liberals are the camels of good news. We can cross entire deserts between oases.

Molly Ivins
Margaret Atwood, the Canadian novelist, once asked a group of women at a university why they felt threatened by men. The women said they were afraid of being beaten, raped, or killed by men. She then asked a group of men why they felt threatened by women. They said they were afraid women would laugh at them.

Molly Ivins