362 Accountability Quotes

Media people should have long noses like an elephant to smell out politicians, mayors, prime ministers and businessmen. We need to know the reality, the good and the bad, not just the appearance.

These capitalists generally act harmoniously and in concert to fleece the people, and now that they have got into a quarrel with themselves, we are called upon to appropriate the people's money to settle the quarrel.

It was my view that the catastrophe. . . . could have been avoided if Vasilevsky had taken the position he should have. He could have taken a different position. . . . but he didn't do that, and as a result, in my view, he had a hand in the destruction of thousands of Red Army fighters in the Kharkov campaign.

Directors and writers have a lot of stress as well, because they have people they answer to.

When Bush says that Abu Ghraib was the work of a few, he forgot to mention that he was one of them.

We're the only branch of government that explains itself in writing every time it makes a decision.

When are we going to stop making excuses for the terrorists and saying that somebody is making them do it? No, these are simply evil people who want to kill.

At no time did I intend to, or do I believe that I did put forward false information to the American people.

President Bush has said that he does not need approval from the UN to wage war, and I'm thinking, well, hell, he didn't need the approval of the American voters to become president, either.

The question is not whether the good outweighs the bad. The question is whether or not the good excuses the bad. And, in my opinion, it doesn't. It never does. As long as wrongs are being commited, in any quantity, and in any ratio to the amount of good that is being done, it is both irresponsible and wrong not to bring awareness to it, and struggle to put an end to it.

My government currently runs things only because the people 'allow' them to run things. It is my responsibility that I do everything I can to keep tabs on my government, keep them honest and make sure that they always act for the good of the people. They must be reminded that they hold no power over the people that the people do not wish for them to hold. If the government begins working in a way that the people don't agree with, they must be made to know that we will rip it to its very foundations and replace it with something that does.

If Nixon is not forced to turn over tapes of his conversations with the ring of men who were conversing on their violations of the law, then liberty will soon be dead in this nation.

All persons possessing any portion of power ought to be strongly and awfully impressed with an idea that they act in trust, and that they are to account for their conduct in that trust to the one great Master, Author, and Founder of society.

Difficulty is the excuse history never accepts.

When the politicians complain that TV turns the proceedings into a circus, it should be made clear that the circus was already there, and that TV has merely demonstrated that not all the performers are well trained.

True penitence condemns to silence. What a man is ready to recall he would be willing to repeat.

I would not vote for the mayor. It's not just because he didn't invite me to dinner, but because on my way into town from the airport there were such enormous potholes.

I attribute my success to this - I never gave or took any excuse.

Bureaucrats: they are dead at 30 and buried at 60. They are like custard pies; you can't nail them to a wall.

My observation is that whenever one person is found adequate to the discharge of a duty... it is worse executed by two persons, and scarcely done at all if three or more are employed therein.

A real failure does not need an excuse. It is an end in itself.

It doesn't matter whether I'm judged criminal. I have a great feeling of guilt - I have a feeling that I ran after Hitler like a wildfire without reason. If I can sacrifice my life to make something good, I'd gladly do it.

President Bush is a liar. He betrayed Nevada and he betrayed the country... All Americans should be concerned, not just because he lied to me or the people of Nevada and indeed all Americans, but because the President's decision threatens Americans' lives.

You can't build a reputation on what you are going to do.

Don't find fault, find a remedy.

The First Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment rights in the United States Constitution were being violated in Albany again and again - freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, the equal protection of the laws - I could count at least 30 such violations. Yet the president, sworn to uphold the Constitution, and all the agencies of the United States government at his disposal, were nowhere to be seen.

Publishers are notoriously slothful about numbers, unless they're attached to dollar signs - unlike journalists, quarterbacks, and felony criminal defendants who tend to be keenly aware of numbers at all times.

Prince Asaka had joined the army only about ten days before its entry into Nanking and in view of the short time he was connected with this army I do not think he can be held responsible. I would say that the Division Commanders are the responsible parties.

Don't blame the marketing department. The buck stops with the chief executive.

The discipline of the written word punishes both stupidity and dishonesty.

We shall be judged by what we do, not by how we felt while we were doing it.

Lots of folks confuse bad management with destiny.

You're so certain that you can hold people to their commitments. No ones ever made them do that before. Can you now?

We brought those cases because we realized that the truth is the engine of our judicial system. We didn't get the straight story, and we had to - had to - act.

Keep the boss aware. Bosses, after all, are held responsible by their own bosses for the performance of their subordinates. They must be able to say: 'I know what Anne [or John] is trying to do.' -- Managing for the Future: The 1990's and Beyond (1992)

At least once every five years every form should be put on trial for its life.

There is no doubt that Jacomoni and Visconti Prasca have a large share of the responsibility in the Albanian affair, but the real blame must be sought elsewhere. It lies entirely with the Duce's command. This is a command that he, the Duce, cannot hold. Let him leave everything to us, and when things go wrong let him punish those responsible.

But if a man shall hope in aught he does To escape the eyes of god, he makes an error.

If Microsoft's long record of deception and untrustworthiness is to be ended, the public remedies must be as bold, sweeping, and effective as the company's private power.

'There can't be any more Fallujahs. Fallujah is the 21st century equivalent of Guernica. We just went in and destroyed that city, drove the people out, killed them, thousands. We don't know how many.'

You're Stone Cold Busted!

No matter how you try to blame it on the president, the actual responsibility for it really would be for the troops that were there. Did they search carefully enough?

The idea of trying to cast blame on President Clinton is just wrong for many, many reasons, not the least of which is I don't think he deserves it.

God knows that I ask no rights, privileges, immunities or prerogatives for mysell If I err, I am ready for the consequences. I hope Khomeini will never deviate from the straight path of Islam which is to fight the oppressive powers.

Man may conceal things from all mortal eyes but everyting about us is preserved with God and He reverts to us all our deeds.

You must remember that all of us have another day, (the Last Day), do not doubt this! We have a day of reckoning before us. Everything will be considered and calculated on that day, man himself should give an account of his doings. On that day, pens, hands, eyes, all come and testify. We have such a day!

This conduct is right in the strike zone of the concept of high crimes and misdemeanors.

How is that worthy of applause? Since when do we celebrate our commander in chief for violating our most basic freedoms, and misleading the American people in the process? When did we start to stand up and cheer for breaking the law? In that moment at the State of the Union, I felt ashamed.

The President was blunt, so I will be blunt: This program is breaking the law, and this President is breaking the law. Not only that, he is misleading the American people in his efforts to justify this program.

Senator Feingold was right about the dangers when the Senate first passed the Patriot Act, and he has remained true to his cause. I stand with him today as I should have the first time.

This is a book about a lie and the liars who told it to the American people. It is also about citizenship and the responsibility of all Americans to hold themselves to the highest standards of citizenship, including holding accountable those we elect to represent us in higher office. It is about truth, justice and the rule of law and the danger imposed on us all by those who lie, pervert justice, and absolve themselves from the rule of law.

You're not listening, Susan. You've got to learn something. Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. He promised to disclose them. And he didn't do it. You would have let him go free; we decided to hold him accountable.

Burden not the back of Aries, Leo, or Taurus, with thy faults, nor make Saturn, Mars, or Venus, guilty of thy Follies.

As excited as I am to be here with the president, I am appalled to be surrounded by the liberal media that is destroying America, with the exception of Fox News. Fox News gives you both sides of every story: the president's side, and the vice president's side. But the rest of you, what are you thinking, reporting on NSA wiretapping or secret prisons in eastern Europe? Those things are secret for a very important reason: they're super-depressing. And if that's your goal, well, misery accomplished. Over the last five years you people were so good -- over tax cuts, WMD intelligence, the effect of global warming. We Americans didn't want to know, and you had the courtesy not to try to find out. Those were good times, as far as we knew.

Then you write, 'Oh, they're just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.' First of all, that is a terrible metaphor. This administration is not sinking. This administration is soaring. If anything, they are rearranging the deck chairs on the Hindenburg.

Exstat et sermo eius in senatu percivilis: 'Siquidem locutus aliter fuerit, dabo operam ut rationem factorum meorum dictorumque reddam; si perseveraverit, in vicem eum odero.'

I do not ask the clemency of the court. I came into it to get justice, having failed in this, I demand the full rigors of the law.

As Governor and Commander-in-Chief of the Oregon National Guard - with more than 1300 Guard troops and many other Oregon soldiers deployed overseas - it is my responsibility to ask whether our national leadership, which had a plan for starting this war, also has a plan for ending it.

I have notified the speaker that I will temporarily step aside from my position as majority leader pursuant to rules of the House Republican Conference and the actions of the Travis County district attorney today.

Little miss queen of hearts you're a strange thing. Why you wanna stay so vague? I'm wandering through this mess you've made to see what I can save.

You have got to stop seeing yourself as a victim, take control and take responsibility.

Don't take a leak on my shoes and tell me it's raining.

My back was up against the wall And you slowly just walked away You never really heard my call When I cried out that way With my face against the sun You pointed out for me to go Then you said I was the one Had to reap what you did sow.

A deputy should have immunity, but this does not exempt him from criminal accountability.

An agent is usually held accountable to his principals. If you do not know the individuals who voted for you, then you do not know for whom you are acting, nor to whom you are accountable. If any body of persons has delegated to you any authority, the disposal of any right or part of a right (supposing a right to be transferable), you must have received it from the individuals composing that body; and you must have some means of learning who those individuals are, or you cannot know for whom you act, and you are utterly irresponsible as an agent.

I believe in open, honest government, where we hold our leaders accountable. I believe in putting the national interests over the special interests. I believe in putting principle above politics. The bottom line: I believe we can do better. I believe we must do better. And if the system's broke - fix it.

G. Gordon Liddy says that Democrats haven't given the president enough credit. I think the president deserves full credit. In fact I think he should be held fully accountable.

A day will come when the world will find the Wehrmacht responsible for these methods, inasmuch as the things happen with our tacit consent.

Be humble. It becomes a creature, a depending and borrowed being, that lives not of itself, but breathes in another's air with another's breath, and is accountable for every moment of time and can call nothing its own, but is absolutely a tenant at will of the great Lord of heaven and earth.

Don't worry son. It's my prerogative.

'At times those who do not want to have their inconsistencies pointed out say in a super-sweet voice to me 'Judge not, lest ye be judged.' I reply 'O.K., judge me, then.''

I honestly don't believe we will be solving the greater human conflict with our efforts. The problem is not a certain type of legislation or even a certain politician; the problem is the same that it has always been. I am the problem.

It was true enough, he did not appear ashamed - merely worried about his own immunity from trial as a war criminal.

Those who need excuses deserve not be excused.

'I would describe a demagogue as a politician who don't keep his promises. On that basis, I'm the first man to have power in Louisiana who ain't a demagogue. I kept every promise I ever made to the people of Louisiana. None of these exes and belly-achers that have been fighting me down there ever kept his promises when he was in office. It was an unheard of thing in Louisiana until Huey P. Long got in.'

I believe that by judging EPA's actions-not just our promise to do what's right, but our work in sampling and cleaning up whatever should be cleaned up-the community will recognize that we are worthy of their trust. [Correction: This quote should be attributed to Michael G. Brown of the U.S. EPA. He made the statement about EPA's on-going efforts to test for and clean up chemicals of potential concern from the collapse of the World Trade Center towers, should those chemicals be present at levels exceeding the Agency's risk threshholds.]

I didn't have a problem with the evacuations in Mississippi or Alabama. They were doing it. Jeb Bush had already ordered evacuations through the Keys as Katrina was making its way through that area. My mistake was in recognizing that, for whatever reason that we might want to discuss later, but for whatever reason, Mayor Nagin and Governor Blanco were reticent to order a mandatory evacuation. And if I, Mike Brown, as an individual could have done something to convince them that this was the big one, and they needed to order a mandatory evacuation, I would have done it... My biggest mistake was not recognising by Saturday that Louisiana was dysfunctional.

The politicians pontificate and manoeuvre with eloquent manifestos and pronouncements saying little about the challenges we must confront.

The issue which concern all of us as citizens of this country, irrespective of our political beliefs and ethnicity, is this: if we are to forbear all legal proceedings against the perpetrators of the events of 19 May 2000 what does that say about our sense of right and wrong? What does it say to those that were directly and indirectly harmed by their actions? Without an accounting, we encourage repetition of this conduct, make light of the pain and suffering people endured and suggest to the impressionable that such conduct is appropriate.

You may choose, if you wish, to parrot the line that Watergate was a 'long national nightmare,' but some of us found it rather exhilarating to see a criminal President successfully investigated and exposed and discredited. And we do not think it in the least bit nightmarish that the Constitution says that such a man is not above the law. Ford's ignominious pardon of this felonious thug meant, first, that only the lesser fry had to go to jail. It meant, second, that we still do not even know why the burglars were originally sent into the offices of the Democratic National Committee. In this respect, the famous pardon is not unlike the Warren Commission: another establishment exercise in damage control and pseudo-reassurance (of which Ford was also a member) that actually raised more questions than it answered. The fact is that serious trials and fearless investigations often are the cause of great division, and rightly so.

...the idea that she belongs in front of a war tribunal is not something I can dignify with a response. Miss Rice presides over a wide range of choices, a wide range of policies. She's handled that vast duty with dignity, with honor...

...if what I say is responsible, I alone am responsible for the saying of it...

We want to make reparation to the Palestinian people for the crimes of Balfour which were committed in the building behind me, when one person, on behalf of one country, promised a second people the lands of a third people - the Palestinians. We are determined that we should stop the privatization of basic services of the British people. We are determined to defend the liberty of the British people which is being taken away day by day under the name of anti-terrorism. Ancient freedoms, which we had for hundreds of years, are being taken away from us under the name of the war on terror, when the real big terrorists are the governments of Britain and the United States. They are the real rogue states breaking international law, invading other people's countries, killing their children in the name of anti-terrorism, when in fact, all they're achieving is to make more terrorists in the world, not less, to make the world more dangerous, rather than less. These are our priorities.

Rickover management objectives:

General, the battle draws to a close and I make my report. This is where and how I fought. I fell wounded, lost heart, but did not desert. Though my teeth clattered from fear, I bound my forehead tightly with a red handkerchief to hide the blood, and ran to the assault. Before you shall pluck out the precious feathers of my jackdaw soul, one by one, until it remains a tiny clod of earth kneaded with blood, sweat, and tears. I shall relate my struggle to you - in order to unburden myself. I shall cast off virtue, shame, and truth - in order to unburden myself. My soul resembles your creation 'Toledo in the Storm'; girded by yellow thunderbolts and oppressive black clouds, fighting a desperate, unbending battle against both light and darkness. You will see my soul, will weigh it between your lanceolate eyebrows, and will judge. Do you remember the grave Cretan saying, 'Return where you have failed, leave where you have succeeded'? If I failed, I shall return to the assault though but a single hour of life remains to me. If I succeeded, I shall open the earth so that I may come and recline at your side. Listen, therefore, to my report, general, and judge. Listen to my life, grandfather, and if I fought with you, if I fell wounded and allowed no one to learn of my suffering, if I never turned my back to the enemy: Give me your blessing!

I see that you are a person who refuses to revise his view of the would. You can only bear to live in a world where all the bad things happen to you are someone else's fault, where everyone must have conspired against you to deprive you of your due. Unfortunately, that world happens not to be the real world

The man who has an intelligent child is doomed to spend his life justifying every decision he makes

Rush has so much contempt for his listeners. He has contempt for you. Because day after day after day after day, he pulls stuff out of his butt that isn't true, and...he's not held accountable for it. No, you don't hold him accountable for it. For you it's just, 'Ok...that was wrong, but......Why does he (Rush Limbaugh) say something like that? He either knows it isn't true, or-he can't possibly know that it's true?...There is certainly no certainty there on his part of 'I'm going to tell the truth now.

But let's agree on strategy and pick out enemies right/Who stands accused of the abuse my own, kind do right

Do you realize that every day there's a guy gettin' fired for stuff that we do, that nobody notices because it's a funny voice doing it?

... I shall not waste any time on such miserable twaddle as to say that I ought to have been elected. ... It is the undoubted right of the people to change their servants, and to remove one and displace him with another at any time they choose, for a good reason, for a bad reason, or for no reason at all. If we are to remain a free people, it is the duty of public servants not grumpily and sourly to accept the verdict of the majority, but joyously to accept that verdict. . . .

But me no buts.