William Galston Quotations

The poor don't need their consciousness raised as to what a good life looks like,

There are things you don't learn in a classroom, and if your circumstances aren't rich in the sort of input you need, you may not learn them at all. Unless you have a home where these things are specifically talked about and reinforced, or a mentor or guide of some sort, you may not be able to figure out where the road is, let alone how to take it, or what direction.

Bush is the most partisan president in modern American history. As a result, voters in both parties are focusing on him, rather than on the specifics of the policies.

If the economy behaves on the upside of the range and things go better than expected in Iraq, then Republicans have a fighting chance to limit their losses. If not, it's going to be a long, grim fall for the Republican Party.

This is a shot to the solar plexus of George Bush's agenda. The ripples go out in so many different directions, to so many different areas of policy, domestic and foreign. It's second only to 9/11 in its impact on the course of the presidency.

They went with their head over their heart. I would predict that trend will continue in 2008, ... That's what we're asking voters to do.

I'm not surprised by the finding that these young women place a high value on marriage, ... The poor do not differ from the rest of America in their aspirations. They want college, a profession, marriage, a house with a picket fence. What distinguishes them is some combination of opportunity and concrete steps from their current reality to their future dream. Basically, what these women have is a magical outlook on life.

When you win an election, you are always inclined to believe you won for the reasons you wanted to win.

The Truth about Leo Strauss is the most balanced and insightful book yet written about Strauss's thought, students, and political influence. It dispels myths promulgated by both friends and foes and persuasively traces the conflicting paths that American thinkers indebted to Strauss have taken.

It's the ideology, stupid. Unless the long-term decline of moderates and rise of conservatives is reversed during the next two years, the ideological balance of the electorate in 2012 could look a lot like it did this year.

You need only do three things in this country to avoid poverty - finish high school, marry before having a child, and marry after the age of 20. Only 8 percent of the families who do this are poor; 79 percent of those who fail to do this are poor.