Never underestimate the intimate relationship of politics and language.ROBERT MCCRUM
This was one of “Five Rules for Politicians Who Want to Be Winners” that McCrum laid out in a 2007 article in The Observer. In discussing the fall of Richard Nixon, he wrote:What really cooked Nixon’s goose with the American voters was the blizzard of “expletive deleted” in the published transcript of Oval Office conversations. High crimes and misdemeanors were one thing. Presidential profanity was something else.
Never forget posterity when devising a policy.
Never think of posterity when making a speech.ROBERT G. MENZIES, former prime minister of Australia
Never take an elevator when you’re in City Hall.HARVEY MILK, quoted by Randy Shilts in The Mayor of Castro Street: The Life and Times of Harvey Milk (1978)
When Milk was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977, he became the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in California. In this observation—which was all about making a dramatic entrance—he was referring to the elegant marble staircase that flows into the lobby of San Francisco’s City Hall. He continued: “Always take that stairway. You can make such an entrance with it.” And then, just to make sure his point was made, he concluded: “You can make such an entrance—take it slowly.”
Never speak of yourself in the third person.THOMAS P. “TIP” O’NEILL JR.
This appeared in O’Neill’s 1993 book All Politics Is Locaclass="underline" And Other Rules of the Game (written with Gary Hymel). The book also contained these admonitions:
Never forget your spouse.
Never forget whence you came.
Never attack an opponent’s family.
Never get introduced to the crowd at sports events.
Never question the honesty or integrity of a colleague.
Never say something you don’t want to see on the front page of the local paper.
Never lose your temper, even when met with insults.CHRISTABEL PANKHURST
Pankhurst made this remark about the women’s suffrage movement in a 1912 article in The Century magazine. She preceded it by writing, “Self-restraint has always been one of our first rules.” The English suffragist returned to the theme in her 1959 memoir Unshackled: How We Won the Vote, where she wrote: “Never lose your temper with the Press or the public is a major rule of political life.”
Never wear a ring on your right hand in a receiving line.
It’s always a little old lady who will squeeze so hard
she’ll bring you to your knees.NANCY REAGAN, quoted in Newsweek in 1987
Never forget that the most powerful force on earth is love.NELSON ROCKEFELLER, a favorite observation
This is how the quotation almost always appears, but in a eulogy at Rockefeller’s 1979 memorial service, Henry Kissinger recalled a slightly different phrasing:In recent years, he and I would often sit on the veranda overlooking his beloved Hudson River in the setting sun. . . . And, as the statues on the lawn glowed in the dimming light, Nelson Rockefeller would occasionally get that squint in his eyes, which betokened a far horizon. And he would say, because I needed it, but, above all, because he deeply felt it: “Never forget that the most profound force in the world is love.”
Never blame a legislative body for not doing something.
When they do nothing, they don’t hurt anybody.
When they do something is when they become dangerous.WILL ROGERS, in a 1920s syndicated column
Rogers is best remembered as a star of stage and film, but he was also an influential newspaper columnist. In a weekly New York Times column that was syndicated to over 500 newspapers, he wrote more than 2,500 columns between 1922 and 1935.
Never hit if you can help it, but when you have to, hit hard.
Never hit soft.
You’ll never get any thanks for hitting soft.THEODORE ROOSEVELT, in a 1912 diary entry
Roosevelt described this as “My cardinal principle” and returned to the theme again and again in his letters, conversations, and speeches. It also echoes the sentiment behind the quotation most often associated with Roosevelt: “Speak softly, but carry a big stick.”
Never go after someone’s strength;
go after what he thinks is his strength,
but what is, in reality, a weakness.KARL ROVE, in Courage and Consequence:
My Life As a Conservative (2010)
Rove used this strategy in many campaigns, most famously against Al Gore, John Kerry, and Ann Richards. About Gore, he wrote: “Al Gore thinks he’s strong because he’s smarter than most people. Fine; depict him as someone who looks down on voters.”
Never forget that television is a visual medium.HERB SCHMERTZ
This is stock advice that Schmertz and other PR consultants give to politicians about how to approach television appearances. Schmertz added:The person sitting out there is a passive viewer who’s going to go away with an impression of you. You might be making a brilliant argument, but what the viewer will remember is whether your necklace jangled every time you turned your head, or whether the shape of your mustache made you look like a shifty character.
Never ask poets about politics or politicians about poetry.SHAUNA SORENSON
Never kick a fresh turd on a hot day.HARRY S TRUMAN
Biographer Merle Miller contrasted Truman and LBJ in his book on President Johnson. LBJ had a coarse, often profane sense of humor, while Truman was “very prim.” Miller wrote: “I never heard Truman utter a sexual joke, but I did hear him make many scatological remarks. Once someone asked him what his philosophy of life was. I’ll never forget his answer: ‘Never kick a fresh turd on a hot day.’”
In a political struggle,
never get personal else the dagger digs too deep.
Your enemy today may need to be your ally tomorrow.JACK VALENTI, in a 1996 address
to the Federal Communications Bar Association
Valenti reprinted the full speech—which he delivered completely without notes—in Speak Up with Confidence: How to Prepare, Learn, and Deliver Effective Speeches (1982). In his classic book on public speaking, Valenti also offered these thoughts:
Never try to speak merely from notes unless you know your subject cold.
As you construct your speech,
never forget that this is not an exercise in personal indulgence;
you are striving to make contact with your audience.
Never rise to your feet without having given thought to what you are going to say.
Whatever happens,
never forget that people would rather be led to perdition by a man,