Molly Ivins Quotes

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Molly Ivins

Profession : Journalist

Birth : August 30, 1944

Rove, of course, is an exceptionally good, exceptionally skillful campaign guy, and Bush himself is really gifted at the political end of politics. But he's always been, as he says, misunderestimated.

Molly Ivins

Old-fashioned anti-immigrant prejudice always brings out some old-fashioned racists.

Molly Ivins

Truth is, I've spent much of my life trying, unsuccessfully, to explode the myths about Texas.

Molly Ivins

Even I felt sorry for Richard Nixon when he left; there's nothing you can do about being born liberal - fish gotta swim, and hearts gotta bleed.

Molly Ivins

Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce.

Molly Ivins

From orphanages to space colonies, it was all shallow but endearingly enthusiastic futurism. Gingrich was the kind of person who read a book or two on something and would then be quite afire as to how this was going to fit into some shining future.

Molly Ivins

When I was first diagnosed, I went out, as a book person, and got some books on cancer and looked up my version of the disease. It said that I had about a 5 percent chance of survival. I said, 'Gosh, well, it's been a good run.' What I didn't realize is that in the two years since those books were published, things had shifted dramatically.

Molly Ivins

I am one of those people who are out of touch with their emotions. I tend to treat my emotions like unpleasant relatives - a long-distance call once or twice or year is more than enough. If I got in touch with them, they might come to stay.

Molly Ivins

Naturally, when it comes to voting, we in Texas are accustomed to discerning that fine hair's-breadth worth of difference that makes one hopeless dipstick slightly less awful than the other. But it does raise the question: Why bother?

Molly Ivins

Preemptive war is what Israel did in '67 with Arab armies on its borders.

Molly Ivins

The only reason to have a positive mental attitude is that it makes life better. It doesn't cure cancer.

Molly Ivins

It is the stories we don't get, the ones we miss, pass over, fail to recognize, don't pick up on, that will send us to hell.

Molly Ivins

'Get along, go along' is not an inspirational philosophy, and only God knows how much moral cowardice it has covered up over the years. Serve your time, collect your chits, and cash 'em in for your home state? No, I'd say we could ask for more than that from our senators.

Molly Ivins

Legislative language is governed by a law of etymology that is also the ancient code of the bureaucracy: It doesn't have to be right, it just has to be close enough for government work. If they understand what you mean, it doesn't matter what you say or how you say it.

Molly Ivins

We should all laugh more at our elected officials - it's good for us and good for them.

Molly Ivins

To mistake Midland for the volk heartland is the West Texas equivalent of assuming that Greenwich, Connecticut, is Levittown.

Molly Ivins

The reason there is no noblesse oblige about Dubya is because he doesn't admit to himself or anyone else that he owes his entire life to being named George W. Bush. He didn't just get a head start by being his father's son - it remained the single most salient fact about him for most of his life.

Molly Ivins

What I've been telling people is that the doctors are gaining on cancer very rapidly. It's almost become a chronic disease, like diabetes - something you can treat. It doesn't go away, and you're not well in the sense of being over it, but you go on and live your life.

Molly Ivins

The uproar of the late '60s - the antiwar movement, black riots, angry women. It was a wonderful time.

Molly Ivins

I only aim at the powerful. When satire is aimed at the powerless, it is not only cruel - it's vulgar.

Molly Ivins