A biography for Bret Stephenshasn’t been written yet.
“The more afraid we are of the shadow of racism, the more conscious we might become of our own unsuspected biases.”
“Since the end of World War II, U.S. presidents of both parties have recognized that foreign and domestic policy do not have to be pursued at the expense of each other.”
“Barack Obama is probably the coolest president this country will ever have.”
“It's easy to deprecate some of the puffery and jingoism that often go with affirmations of 'American greatness.' It's also easy to confuse greatness with perfection, as if evidence of our shortcomings is proof of our mediocrity.”
“All societies make necessary moral distinctions between high crimes and misdemeanors, mortal and lesser sins.”
“I get if you're a conservative, and you're saying, I don't know, 'Government shouldn't be mandating what's taught in classrooms,' or, 'Government is too intrusive in our economic life,' well, that's standard conservatism.”
“I don't see the point of belonging to a party on the increasingly dubious assumption that it's slightly less bad than the opposition.”
“It's normal that elections make fierce partisans of many of us. It's normal that Mr. Trump would attract the usual right-wing buffoons to his banners. Normal, also, is that many voters may not be troubled by Mr. Trump's cruder statements when they hear him addressing their deepest economic and social anxieties.”
“In every generation, there's a strong tendency for everyone to think like everyone else.”
“Perhaps if there were less certitude about our climate future, more Americans would be interested in having a reasoned conversation about it.”
“I routinely interview college students, mostly from top schools, and I notice that their brains are like old maps, with lots of blank spaces for the uncharted terrain. It's not that they lack for motivation or IQ. It's that they can't connect the dots when they don't know where the dots are in the first place.”
“'Character Doesn't Count' has become a de facto G.O.P. motto. 'Virtue Doesn't Matter' might be another. But character does count, and virtue does matter, and Trump's shortcomings prove it daily.”
“I think that for the United States, Hillary Clinton, as awful as I find her, is a survivable event. I'm not so sure about Donald Trump.”
“There are necessary taboos and essential decencies in every morally healthy society.”
“In the scale of American blunders - from the Dred Scott decision to the Neutrality Acts of the 1930s to the tragedy of Vietnam - is the Trump presidency really unique?”
“The supposedly petty sexual harassment that so many women have to endure, from Hollywood studios to the factory floor at Ford, is a national outrage that needs to end. Period.”
“Ms. Rice was a bad national security adviser and a bad secretary of state. She was on the wrong side of some of the administration's biggest internal policy fights. She had a tendency to flip-flop when it came to the president's core priorities, and her political misjudgment more than once cost Mr. Bush dearly.”
“When Trump attacks the news media, he's kicking a wounded animal.”
“I write my columns pretty carefully.”
“The candidacy of Donald Trump is the open sewer of American conservatism.”