Mark Shields President Quotations

Let's give the president some due.

From 1976, Judy to 1996, we had six presidential elections. And it was run under the Campaign Finance Reform Act of 1974. In all six of them, every candidate agreed to limits of what he could collect in contributions and what he could spend in seeking a nomination. And they all abided by it.

I have my disagreements with President Obama, but President Obama has run an amazingly scandal-free administration, not only he himself, but the people around him. He's chosen people who have been pretty scandal-free.

I think she [Hillary Clinton] would be far superior to President [Barack] Obama, who is basically remote, aloof and not involved with - he doesn't deal with members of Congress.

Peter Hart, the pollster, has a question when he asks about presidential or vice presidential candidates, what kind of a neighbor would they be? And several Democrats - George W. Bush was always seen to be a good friendly neighbor who would pick up the newspapers if you were out of town or check your mail.

All about midterm elections is turnouts. And turnout is measured by enthusiasm, intensity, how interested are people. And President Obama - candidate Obama had it on his side in 2008. The Democrats had it on their side in 2006. The enthusiasm, the intensity, the passion was all on their side.

There is no question that, in 1980, Ronald Reagan had been portrayed as a war-monger, somebody who couldn't do anything off a script. And the one debate with President Jimmy Carter, he stood toe-to-toe and reassured people that he wasn't bound and determined to start World War III on the spot and could make a coherent statement.

When you run for president of the United States, everybody does the same thing in the campaign-they talk about veterans, how much they admire them, how grateful they are.

In the 2004 presidential election, we saw a wonderful example of citizens making contributions. In fact, individual giving to both the Kerry and Bush campaigns was the highest in our nation's history.