Mario Cuomo

“If I made a mistake in terms of running for president, the mistake was not in refusing to run in '91.”

“No one in the modern history of this country, no president, has done more to move toward a balanced budget than has President Bill Clinton.”

“I was badly mauled by people in New York State for being against the death penalty for 12 years.”

“Decide exactly what you want to achieve. Do you want to help people, or do you want to be powerful?”

“Bill Clinton has done more to help the middle class than any leader in decades.”

“Debates are boring.”

“I am a trial lawyer. Matilda says that at dinner on a good day I sound like an affidavit.”

“I think - something I learned recently looking up the meaning of ideology. If you look in American encyclopedias, it says, you know, 'Rules for - basic rules for a system of economics or politics.' If you look in the Oxford, it says that, and then it says... 'Despite - and people will hold these propositions despite events.'”

“America was born in outrageous ambition, so bold as to be improbable. The deprived, the oppressed, the powerless from all over the globe came here with little more than the desire to realize themselves.”

“I talk and talk and talk, and I haven't taught people in fifty years what my father taught me by example in one week.”

“I did once answer the question 'What would you say on your tombstone?' I know what I would say: 'Mario Cuomo, 1932 - dash,' and, 'He tried.' That's it.”

“There is no basis to say I'm being coy about running for president. If I chose to explore the presidency, I wouldn't do it in a backward way. I'll say, 'I'm exploring the presidency.'”

“I went to electric razors so I would not have to look at myself in the morning.”

“In 1980, in 1984, millions of middle-class Democrats became Reagan Democrats, and more of them drifted toward the Republicans with Bush in 1988.”

“In '86 or '87, the welfare lists were at the lowest level in 17 years. Why? Because the economy was the best it was in 17 years. There were jobs.”

“I love bunt plays. I love the idea of the bunt. I love the idea of the sacrifice. Even the word is good. Giving yourself up for the good of the whole.”

“I wish I were as good a man as my son is.”

“I had not even thought of running for president until one day in 1991, at a small fund-raiser, completely unanticipated, someone stood up and said, 'Hey, Mario, in all the years we've supported you, we've never heard you talk about the presidency, and we want to know why not.'”

“The Catholic Church did not always teach that life begins at conception.”

“Hate sells.”