HST Bons Mots

Harry S Truman (1884-1972) was the first president I remember. I remember hearing my grandparents talk about the results of the 1948 presidential election. Compare HST's command of the language with the current occupant of the White House. Even the Dickster—he of the F-bomb—can't hold a candle to HST's epithets. If this is (fair & balanced) pithiness, so be it.

Life is good. 
Harry S Truman Quotes

A bureaucrat is a Democrat who holds some office that a Republican wants.
Harry S Truman

A leader in the Democratic Party is a boss, in the Republican Party he is a leader.
Harry S Truman

A pessimist is one who makes difficulties of his opportunities and an optimist is one who makes opportunities of his difficulties.
Harry S Truman

A politician is a man who understands government. A statesman is a politician who's been dead for 15 years.
Harry S Truman

A President cannot always be popular.
Harry S Truman

A president either is constantly on top of events or, if he hesitates, events will soon be on top of him. I never felt that I could let up for a moment.
Harry S Truman

A President needs political understanding to run the government, but he may be elected without it.
Harry S Truman

Actions are the seed of fate deeds grow into destiny.
Harry S Truman

All my life, whenever it comes time to make a decision, I make it and forget about it.
Harry S Truman

All the president is, is a glorified public relations man who spends his time flattering, kissing, and kicking people to get them to do what they are supposed to do anyway.
Harry S Truman

Always be sincere, even if you don't mean it.
Harry S Truman

America was not built on fear. America was built on courage, on imagination and an unbeatable determination to do the job at hand.
Harry S Truman

Any man who has had the job I've had and didn't have a sense of humor wouldn't still be here.
Harry S Truman

Art is parasitic on life, just as criticism is parasitic on art.
Harry S Truman

Being too good is apt to be uninteresting.
Harry S Truman

Carry the battle to them. Don't let them bring it to you. Put them on the defensive and don't ever apologize for anything.
Harry S Truman

Experience has shown how deeply the seeds of war are planted by economic rivalry and social injustice.
Harry S Truman

He wasn't used to being criticized, and he never did get it through his head that's what politics is all about. He was used to getting his ass kissed.
Harry S Truman

He's one of the few in the history of this country to run for high office talking out of both sides of his mouth at the same time and lying out of both sides.
Harry S Truman

How do you live a long life? "Take a two-mile walk every morning before breakfast."
Harry S Truman

I do not believe there is a problem in this country or the world today which could not be settled if approached through the teaching of the Sermon on the Mount.
Harry S Truman

I don't give a damn about "The Missouri Waltz" but I can't say it out loud because it's the song of Missouri. It's as bad as "The Star-Spangled Banner" so far as music is concerned.
Harry S Truman

I don't want it torn down. I think it's the greatest monstrosity in America.
Harry S Truman

I had faith in Israel before it was established, I have in it now. I believe it has a glorious future before it - not just another sovereign nation, but as an embodiment of the great ideals of our civilization.
Harry S Truman

I have found the best way to give advice to your children is to find out what they want and then advise them to do it.
Harry S Truman

I have no desire to crow over anybody or to see anybody eating crow, figuratively or otherwise. We should all get together and make a country in which everybody can eat turkey whenever he pleases.
Harry S Truman

I have read your lousy review of Margaret's concert. I've come to the conclusion that you are an eight ulcer man on a four ulcer job Some day I hope to meet you. When that happens you'll need a new nose, a lot of beefsteak for black eyes and perhaps a supporter below.
Harry S Truman

I never did give anybody hell. I just told the truth and they thought it was hell.
Harry S Truman

I never gave anybody hell! I just told the truth and they thought it was hell.
Harry S Truman

I remember when I first came to Washington. For the first six months you wonder how the hell you ever got here. For the next six months you wonder how the hell the rest of them ever got here.
Harry S Truman

I was the only calm one in the house. You see I've been shot at by experts.
Harry S Truman

I would rather have peace in the world than be President.
Harry S Truman

I've said many a time that I think the Un-American Activities Committee in the House of Representatives was the most un-American thing in America!
Harry S Truman

If I hadn't been President of the United States, I probably would have ended up a piano player in a bawdy house.
Harry S Truman

If I'd known how much packing I'd have to do, I'd have run again.
Harry S Truman

If you can't convince them, confuse them.
Harry S Truman

If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.
Harry S Truman

In my opinion eight years as president is enough and sometimes too much for any man to serve in that capacity.
Harry S Truman

In my Sunday School class there was a beautiful little girl with golden curls. I was smitten at once and still am.
Harry S Truman

In reading the lives of great men, I found that the first victory they won was over themselves... self-discipline with all of them came first.
Harry S Truman

Intense feeling too often obscures the truth.
Harry S Truman

It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.
Harry S Truman

It is terrible-and I mean terrible-nuisance to be kin to the president of the United States.
Harry S Truman

It is understanding that gives us an ability to have peace. When we understand the other fellow's viewpoint, and he understands ours, then we can sit down and work out our differences.
Harry S Truman

It seems like there was always somebody for supper.
Harry S Truman

It sure is hell to be president.
Harry S Truman

It's a recession when your neighbor loses his job; it's a depression when you lose yours.
Harry S Truman

It's plain hokum. If you can't convince 'em, confuse 'em. It's an old political trick. But this time it won't work.
Harry S Truman

Men make history and not the other way around. In periods where there is no leadership, society stands still. Progress occurs when courageous, skillful leaders seize the opportunity to change things for the better.
Harry S Truman

Most of the problems a President has to face have their roots in the past.
Harry S Truman

My choice early in life was either to be a piano-player in a whorehouse or a politician. And to tell the truth, there's hardly any difference.
Harry S Truman

My father was not a failure. After all, he was the father of a president of the United States.
Harry S Truman

Nixon is one of the few in the history of this country to run for high office talking out of both sides of his mouth at the same time and lying out of both sides.
Harry S Truman

Our conference in 1945 did much more than draft an international agreement among 50 nations. [We] set down on paper the only principles which will enable civilized human life to continue to survive on this globe.
Harry S Truman

Richard Nixon is a no good, lying bastard. He can lie out of both sides of his mouth at the same time, and if he ever caught himself telling the truth, he'd lie just to keep his hand in.
Harry S Truman

That precedent should continue-not by a Constitutional amendment but by custom based on the honor of the man in the office.
Harry S Truman

The atom bomb was no "great decision." It was merely another powerful weapon in the arsenal of righteousness.
Harry S Truman

The best way to give advice to your children is to find out what they want and then advise them to do it.
Harry S Truman

The buck stops here!
Harry S Truman

The human animal cannot be trusted for anything good except en masse. The combined thought and action of the whole people of any race, creed or nationality, will always point in the right direction.
Harry S Truman

The Marine Corps is the Navy's police force and as long as I am President that is what it will remain. They have a propaganda machine that is almost equal to Stalin's.
Harry S Truman

The only things worth learning are the things you learn after you know it all.
Harry S Truman

The President is always abused. If he isn't, he isn't doing anything.
Harry S Truman

The reward of suffering is experience.
Harry S Truman

The United Nations is designed to make possible lasting freedom and independence for all its members.
Harry S Truman

The White House is the finest prison in the world.
Harry S Truman

Therefore to re-establish that custom, although by a quibble I could say I've only had one term, I am not a candidate and will not accept the nomination for another term.
Harry S Truman

This administration is going to be cussed and discussed for years to come.
Harry S Truman

To hell with them. When history is written they will be the sons of bitches - not I.
Harry S Truman

Upon books the collective education of the race depends; they are the sole instruments of registering, perpetuating and transmitting thought.
Harry S Truman

We believe that all men are created equal because they are created in the image of God.
Harry S Truman

We must build a new world, a far better world - one in which the eternal dignity of man is respected.
Harry S Truman

We must have strong minds, ready to accept facts as they are.
Harry S Truman

We shall never be able to remove suspicion and fear as potential causes of war until communication is permitted to flow, free and open, across international boundaries.
Harry S Truman

We're going to be buried out here. I like the idea because I may just want to get up some day and stroll into my office. And I can hear you saying, "Harry-you oughtn't!"
Harry S Truman

Well, I wouldn't say that I was in the great class, but I had a great time while I was trying to be great.
Harry S Truman

When even one American-who has done nothing wrong-is forced by fear to shut his mind and close his mouth-then all Americans are in peril.
Harry S Truman

When you have an efficient government, you have a dictatorship.
Harry S Truman

Whenever a fellow tells me he's bipartisan, I know he's going to vote against me.
Harry S Truman

Whenever you have an efficient government you have a dictatorship.
Harry S Truman

Whenever you put a man on the Supreme Court he ceases to be your friend.
Harry S Truman

Why, this fellow don't know any more about politics than a pig knows about Sunday.
Harry S Truman

You and I are stuck with the necessity of taking the worst of two evils or none at all. So-I'm taking the immature Democrat as the best of the two. Nixon is impossible.
Harry S Truman

You can always amend a big plan, but you can never expand a little one. I don't believe in little plans. I believe in plans big enough to meet a situation which we can't possibly foresee now.
Harry S Truman

You can never get all the facts from just one newspaper, and unless you have all the facts, you cannot make proper judgements about what is going on.
Harry S Truman

You know that being an American is more than a matter of where your parents came from. It is a belief that all men are created free and equal and that everyone deserves an even break.
Harry S Truman

You want a friend in Washington? Get a dog.
Harry S Truman