Samantha Power Quotes

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Samantha Power

Profession : Public Servant

Birth : September 21, 1970

On the rare occasions when U.N. blue helmets have made the news in the past, it has unfortunately too often been in the context of situations where peacekeepers have failed to shield civilians, or even when the peacekeepers themselves have been involved in abuse.

Samantha Power

Over the years, Western governments have been criticized for working with foreign police who have proved abusive or corrupt.

Samantha Power

Virtually all of Darfur's six million residents are Muslim, and, because of decades of intermarriage, almost everyone has dark skin and African features.

Samantha Power

Countries that intervene militarily rarely do so out of pure altruism.

Samantha Power

History is laden with belligerent leaders using humanitarian rhetoric to mask geopolitical aims. History also shows how often ill-informed moralism has led to foreign entanglements that do more harm than good.

Samantha Power

Americans have long trusted the views of Democrats on the environment, the economy, education, and health care, but national security is the one matter about which Republicans have maintained what political scientists call 'issue ownership.'

Samantha Power

President Reagan, of course, did more than any other person to entrench the Republican reputation for toughness on national security.

Samantha Power

In the 2000 election, George W. Bush, who had shirked military service, succeeded in presenting himself as more reliable on national security than Al Gore.

Samantha Power

America needs a sensible, sustainable Iran policy that can meet U.S. security and economic interests, command international support and withstand the shifting Middle Eastern sands.

Samantha Power

Engaging Iran won't guarantee improved U.S.-Iranian relations or a more stable Gulf region. But not engaging means more of the same.

Samantha Power

Zimbabweans are severely malnourished, and deaths from starvation occur even in the cities. The country has not yet suffered nationwide famine only because international donors have stepped in.

Samantha Power

As even a democracy like the United States has shown, waging war can benefit a leader in several ways: it can rally citizens around the flag, it can distract them from bleak economic times, and it can enrich a country's elites.

Samantha Power

The story of U.S. policy during the genocide in Rwanda is not a story of willful complicity with evil. U.S. officials did not sit around and conspire to allow genocide to happen.

Samantha Power

When confronting most crises, whether historic or contemporary, aid agencies generally muddle along on a case-by-case basis. They weigh insufficient information, extrapolate somewhat blindly about long-term pros and cons, and reluctantly arrive at decisions meant to do the most good and the least harm.

Samantha Power

The U.S. government engages with many countries around the world in official dialogues on human rights.

Samantha Power

India is at the vanguard of figuring out how to exploit technology and innovation on behalf of democratic accountability.

Samantha Power

Foreign policy is an explicitly amoral enterprise.

Samantha Power

American decision-makers must understand how damaging a foreign policy that privileges order and profit over justice really is in the long term.

Samantha Power

You know, there is a long tradition in the U.S. of, um, promoting elections up to the point that you get an outcome you don't like. Look at Latin America in the Cold War.

Samantha Power

I happen to miss the Constitution; I thought it was a good document.

Samantha Power