Mario Cuomo

“Sometimes comforting the afflicted does require afflicting the comfortable.”

“I will take a draft to the Yankees or to the Mets. A draft for president is not conceivable.”

“In 1982, I wrote in my diary that life is motion, not joy. If the way you measure success in life is by how much joy it brings you, you're measuring inaccurately. Life is also sadness, defeat, striving. It is many things.”

“Outrage is easy, cheap, and oversold. The nation needs less anger and more thoughtful reflection, less shouting and more listening, less dissembling and more honesty.”

“In 1962, President Kennedy succeeded in captivating Americans by explaining the advantages of being the first country to reach the moon and the dangers of allowing another nation to beat us there.”

“The American people need no course in philosophy or political science of church history to know that God should not be made into a celestial party chairman.”

“David Robinson chose to stay at Navy. He talked about commitment, loyalty and values. I wonder how many of us would choose these virtues rather than the chance of becoming a millionaire, especially if you were a college sophomore when you had to make that choice.”

“If I want to run for president, you'll be able to tell.”

“I concentrated on a lot of things, so very few people saw me as an education governor, an infrastructure governor.”

“We must get the American public to look past the glitter, beyond the showmanship, to the reality, the hard substance of things. And we'll do it not so much with speeches that will bring people to their feet as with speeches that bring people to their senses.”

“My parents were immigrants.”

“A lot of my stories about the old days, they're delicious and funny. But every time I recall the early days, it's painful. With every anecdote, it's painful because you're summoning up the terribly, terribly difficult life of my parents. And it's painful because I didn't realize at the time how hard it was for them.”

“Religion is extremely important in this democracy - so important that it occupies a prime position in the Bill of Rights.”

“The Mafia is a question every time an Italian raises his head.”

“The mugger who is arrested is back on the street before the police officer, but the person mugged may not be back on the street for a long time, if ever.”

“Every minute brings a new opportunity. Every minute brings new growth, new experiences.”

“Every time I've done something that doesn't feel right, it's ended up not being right.”

“The beauty of America is that I don't have to deny my past to affirm my present. No one does. We can love this nation like a parent and still embrace our ancestral home like cherished grandparents.”

“I have no plans, and no plans to plan.”

“I am one who believes that the world goes from the slime to the sublime. And you can take Darwin and all your philosophers and all your ontologists, and that's the direction.”