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There Are Two Outstanding Issues In Democratic Politics These Days. One Is The Relationship With The Media, Which Is Now 24/7, And Operates With A Completely Different Intensity Than Even 15 Or 20 Years Ago. How Do We Have A Proper Conversation Between Leaders And Country When It's Moderated Sometimes In A Very Partisan And Inflammatory Way? And The Second Thing Is The Effectiveness Of Our Democracy. How Do We Get The Right Gene And Talent Pool In Politics?

-Tony Blair

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There Are Two Outstanding

Tony Blair

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There Are Two Outstanding Issues In Democratic Politics These Days. One Is The Relationship With The Media, Which Is Now 24/7, And Operates With A Completely Different Intensity Than Even 15 Or 20 Years Ago. How Do We Have A Proper Conversation Between Leaders And Country When It's Moderated Sometimes In A Very Partisan And Inflammatory Way? And The Second Thing Is The Effectiveness Of Our Democracy. How Do We Get The Right Gene And Talent Pool In Politics?

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There's A Huge Wave Of Anti-establishment Feeling. There's An Enormous Amount Of Anger. And It's Collapsing Governments And Political Movements Across The World Right Now.

Saddam Was A Threat, That The Threat Had To Be Dealt With.

I Think It Is Vitally Important To Study History. If We Are Going To Lead Britain Safely Into The Future, It Is Essential That We Understand Our Country's Historical Roots. If We Can Learn The Lessons Of The Past, We Will Be Able To Avoid Making Mistakes In The Future.

We Expected, I Expected To Find Actual Usable, Chemical Or Biological Weapons After We Entered Iraq. But I Have To Accept, As The Months Have Passed, It Seems Increasingly Clear That At The Time Of Invasion, Saddam Did Not Have Stockpiles Of Chemical Or Biological Weapons Ready To Deploy.

There Is Nothing Like Waking Up At Six In The Morning And Changing A Baby's Nappy To Bring You Face To Face With Life's Reality.

Values Unrelated To Modern Reality Are Not Just Electorally Hopeless, The Values Themselves Become Devalued. They Have No Purchase On The Real World.

In No Relationship At The Top Of Any Walk Of Life Is It Always Easy, Least Of All In Politics Which Matters So Much And Which Is Conducted In Such A Piercing Spotlight.

So Actually I Only Got A Mobile Phone The Day After I Left Being Prime Minister.

Sometimes And In Particular Dealing With A Dictator, The Only Chance Of Peace Is A Readiness For War.

We Are Asked Now Seriously To Accept That In The Last Few Years-contrary To All History, Contrary To All Intelligence-saddam Decided Unilaterally To Destroy Those Weapons. I Say That Such A Claim Is Palpably Absurd.

No One Is To Blame For The Breakdown In Trust Between Politics, Media And The Public.

I Will Do What It Takes To Help Ed Miliband Win General Election.

I Believe The Bicentenary Offers Us A Chance Not Just To Say How Profoundly Shameful The Slave Trade Was - How We Condemn Its Existence Utterly And Praise Those Who Fought For Its Abolition - But Also To Express Our Deep Sorrow That It Could Ever Have Happened And Rejoice At The Better Times We Live In Today.

There Are Unquestionably Links Between Al-qaida And Iraq.

The First Big Choice: A Government With The Strength To Deliver Stability, Or A Government That Takes The Country Back To Boom And Bust.

I See The Koran Very Much As An Outsider. It Stands In The Great Prophetic Tradition Of Trying To Return People To The Basic Principles Of Spirituality. Taken For Its Time, It Was An Extraordinarily Progressive Declaration Of Principle. It Is Also Extraordinary For A Christian To Read: For Example, There Are More References To Mary Than In The Gospels. The Tragedy Is That It Has Been So Warped And Misapplied.

I Think Conspiracy Theories Have Gotten More And More Close To The Mainstream Because What You've Got Is A Fragmentation Of The Media, Where The Media Becomes Much More Polarized Today, Left And Right.

I Didn't Come Into Politics To Change The Labour Party. I Came Into Politics To Change The Country.

The Understanding Which Has Driven New Labour's Reform Is To Put The Individual Citizen - The Patient, The Parent, The Pupil, The Law Abiding Citizen - At The Centre Of Each Public Service, With The Service Reformed To Meet Their Individual Requirements

A Lot Of The Politics That Is Going On Left And Right At The Moment Is More About A Protest, Which We Should Respond To. It's Not Often About A Policy. And That's Why What You Get Is This Strange Coalition Of Different Views Of What The Future Should Be, Coming Together In Alliance To Protest Against The Status Quo.

The Donald Trump Phenomenon In The U.s. Is Mirrored Completely By The Brexit Phenomenon In The U.k. It's Very Similar Forces. And What Is Interesting To Me Is There Are Two Different Groups That Come Together, Who Don't Really Agree With Each Other, But Have Come Together In Unity Against, If You Like, What Is Perceived As The Status Quo, Or - And Certainly What Is A More Center-right Or Center-left Type Of Politics.

People Divide Into Groups Where They Talk To Each Other, But Don't Talk Across The Divide. And Yet Most Of The Challenges We Face In The World Today Are Challenges That Are To Do With Trade, With Technology, With How You Make Sure That People Are Properly Educated, Reform Your Health Care System.

And The Problem Is, I Can Apologise For The Information That Turned Out To Be Wrong, But I Can't, Sincerely At Least, Apologise For Removing Saddam.

Education, Education, Education

The Moment You Stigmatize A Whole Group Of People - For Example, Muslims - Then, Obviously, You Make The Decent, Law-abiding Muslims Feel As If They're Under Threat In Some Way Or That Their Legitimacy, As Members Or Citizens Of Society, Is Brought Into Question.

The Spread Of Freedom Is The Best Security For The Free.

I May Find Saddam Hussein's Regime Abhorrent - Any Normal Person Would - But The Survival Of It Is In His Hands.

I Had No Intention Of Returning Into The British Political Debate, Really At All, Even Though I've Obviously Got Very Strong Views On It, Until Brexit Happened, Because I Think Brexit Is A Destiny-changing Decision For My Country.

Stirring Is Ok. It Just Depends What Happens In The End.

Actually The Royal Family Were Very Gracious And Good To Me. But I Also Found That The British Establishment Were Never Quite Sure What To Make Of Me. I Was A Labour Figure, But I'd Come From A Very Middle-class Background. In One Sense I Offended Both Traditional Right And Traditional Left. But I Thought That Was No Bad Thing.

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Fanaticism Is Not A State Of Religion But A State Of Mind.

What People Should Understand Is That I Adore The Labour Party.

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We Expected, I Expected To Find Actual Usable, Chemical Or Biological Weapons After We Entered Iraq.

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Times Are Tough But They Are Tough Because The Government Is Trying To Do The Right Thing, Whether On Public Service Reform, Education, Health, Anti-social Behaviour And Welfare, Or In Counter-terrorism.

The Iraq Survey Group Has Already Found Massive Evidence Of A Huge System Of Clandestine Laboratories.

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Retreat Might Give Us A Moment Of Respite But Years Of Repentance At Our Weakness Would, I Believe, Follow.

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We Know British Muslims, In General, Abhor The Actions Of The Extremists.

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This Mass Terrorism Is The New Evil In Our World Today

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My Faith Foundation Works To Bring About A Greater Respect And Understanding Between Different Faiths. We Basically Work With Six Popular Religions In The World Which Are The Three Abrahamic Religions, Hinduism And Buddhism And Sikhism.

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The View We Took At The Time And We Take It Now Is That The War Was Justified Legally Because He [saddam Hussein] Remained In Breach Of Un Resolutions.

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As For Those That Carried Out These Attacks There Are No Adequate Words Of Condemnation. Their Barbarism Will Stand As Their Shame For All Eternity.

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I Can't Stand Politicians Who Wear God On Their Sleeves.

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If You Don't See The Internet As An Opportunity, It Will Become A Threat. In Two Or Three Year's Time, The Internet Will Become As Commonplace In The Office As The Telephone.

What We Want To See Is The Development Of Human Rights And Greater Democracy, Not Just Because It Is Our System But Because We Think That's The Best Way That Economic And Political Development Go Hand In Hand.

I Say To The Taliban: Surrender The Terrorists; Or Surrender Power. It's Your Choice.

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Mass Destruction

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I Can Only Go One Way. I've Not Got A Reverse Gear.

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It's Not A Burning Ambition For Me To Make Sure That David Beckham Earns Less Money.

What The Commission That Myself And Leon Panetta Is Trying To Do Is Analyze This In Two Respects. First Of All, What's The Right Military Response And Security Response?

I Happen To Think It's The Politics That Makes You Electable, But The Reason For That Is Politicians Sometimes Talk About Electability As If It's Just A Matter Of Conning The Public. Actually, It's A Matter Of Persuading The Public, And In My Experience, Usually, The Public Gets It Right.

I Don't Think There Is A Way Politically To Beat "insurgent Movement Of Populism".

Power Without Principle Is Barren, But Principle Without Power Is Futile. This Is A Party Of Government, And I Will Lead It As A Party Of Government.

The Kaleidoscope Has Been Shaken. The Pieces Are In Flux. Soon They Will Settle Again. Before They Do, Let Us Re-order This World Around Us.

What Is Obviously Unfair Is That The Half Of The Population That Doesn't Go To University That's Often On Lower Incomes Pays More Taxes In Order To Send Other People To University, Without Them, You Know, Contributing.

Self-interest And Mutual Interest Are Inextricably Linked. National Interests Can Best Be Advanced Through Collective Action, ... Calculate Not Just The Human Misery Of The Poor Themselves. Calculate Our Loss: The Aid, The Lost Opportunity To Trade, The Short-term Consequences Of The Multiple Conflicts; The Long-term Consequences On The Attitude To The Wealthy World Of Injustice And Abject Deprivation Amongst The Poor.

And Just As The Terrorist Seeks To Divide Humanity In Hate, So We Have To Unify It Around An Idea. And That Idea Is Liberty.

Our Ultimate Weapon Is Not Our Guns But Our Beliefs ... Ours Are Not Western Values. They Are The Universal Values Of The Human Spirit And Anywhere, Any Time, Ordinary People Are Given The Chance To Choose, The Choice Is The Same. Freedom Not Tyranny. Democracy Not Dictatorship. The Rule Of Law Not The Rule Of The Secret Police. The Spread Of Freedom Is The Best Security For The Free. It Is Our Last Line Of Defence And Our First Line Of Attack.

Society Works By Putting Opportunity And Responsibility Together.

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I'm An Avowed Centrist, And I Believe That - Centrism Is Often - It's Almost The Wrong Word To Use, Because It's Often Seen As Sort Of Splitting The Difference Between Right And Left.

What We Have Got To Do Now Is Use This Event, The Resignation Of The Whole Commission, To Drive Through Root And Branch Reform.

Any Parent Wants The Best For Their Children. I Am Not Going To Make A Choice For My Child On The Basis Of What Is The Politically Correct Thing To Do.

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The 21st Century Will Not Be About The Battle Between Capitalism And Socialism But Between The Forces Of Progress And The Forces Of Conservatism.

My View Is That You Still, In Order To Win From The Labour Perspective, Have To Have A Strong Alliance With Business As Well As The Unions. You Have Got To Be Very Much In The Centre Ground On Things Like Public Sector Reform.

...we Must Support And Protect Individuals And Companies Engaged In Life Saving Medical Research

I Think Everyone's Had Their Pound Of Flesh And Now It's Time To Move On.

Time To Move On

There Are People Who Are Anxious About Immigration For Reasons That Are Perfectly Sensible. They Think It's Uncontrolled. They Think It's, Therefore, Arbitrary In Its Consequences, And There Are Some Communities Affected Much More Deeply Than Others.

The Purpose Of Terrorism Lies Not Just In The Violent Act Itself. It Is In Producing Terror. It Sets Out To Inflame, To Divide, To Produce Consequences Which They Then Use To Justify Further Terror.

That's The Art Of Leadership. To Make Sure That What Shouldn't Happen, Doesn't Happen.

At The Heart Of My Politics Has Always Been The Value Of Community, The Belief That We Are Not Merely Individuals Struggling In Isolation From Each Other, But Members Of A Community Who Depend On Each Other, Who Benefit From Each Other's Help, Who Owe Obligations To Each Other. From That Everything Stems: Solidarity, Social Justice, Equality, Freedom.

Look, I Am Very Competitive.

The Emphasis Placed By More And More Companies On Corporate Social Responsibility, Symbolises The Recognition That Prosperity Is Best Achieved In An Inclusive Society.

It's Not That Tens Of Millions Of People All Want To Be Violent. But They Share The Worldview That Then, At Its Extreme, Gives Rise To The Violence. And In My View, This Is Why This Is Such A Global Problem.

All The Evidence Here, For Example, In Britain, Is That Migrants, Particularly From The Rest Of Europe, Who Come Here Contribute Far More In Taxes.

Ah Yes, Liberal Democrats Unified As Ever In Opportunism And In Error.

I Don't Concede It At All That The Intelligence At The Time Was Wrong.

People Always Think American Politics Is Very Different, But Usually It Is A Predictor Of What Happens In The Politics Elsewhere.

There Is No Way You're Going To Have An Event Like 9/11 And Expect Things To Remain The Same. They Killed 3,000 People In New York On That Day, And If They Could Have They Would've Killed 300,000.

What Is True About (ex-iraq Survey Group Head) David Kay's Evidence, And This Is Something I Have To Accept, And Is One Of The Reasons Why I Think We Now Need A New Inquiry - It Is True David Kay Is Saying We Have Not Found Large Stockpiles Of Actual Weapons.

After The Terrible Events Of Last Week, There Is Still The Shock And Disbelief; There Is Anger; There Is Fear; But There Is Also, Throughout The World, A Profound Sense Of Solidarity; There Is Courage; There Is A Surging Of The Human Spirit.

Terrible Events

It Is Absurd To Say In Respect Of Any Intelligence That It Is Infallible, But If You Ask Me What I Believe, I Believe The Intelligence Was Correct, And I Think In The End We Will Have An Explanation.

Genetic Modification Has Many Different Areas, For Example In Medicine, And Britain Is At The Leading Edge Of This New Technology. I Don't Know, But People Tell Me, It Could Indeed By The Leading Science Of The 21st Century. All I Say To People Is: 'just Keep An Open Mind And Let Us Proceed According To Genuine Scientific Evidence.'

I Think Most People Who Have Dealt With Me Think I'm A Pretty Straight Sort Of Guy, And I Am.

I Still Think The World Is Better Off And Safer Without Saddam Hussein.

I Just Want To Say This. I Want To Say It Gently But I Want To Say It Firmly: There Is A Tendency For The World To Say To America, ‘the Big Problems Of The World Are Yours, You Go And Sort Them Out,’ And Then To Worry When America Wants To Sort Them Out.

Surely We Have The Wit And Will To Develop Economically Without Despoiling The Very Environment We Depend Upon

You Don't Have To Keep Looking At The Future Foreign Policy In Terms, Simply, Of The Past.

Because I Happen To Believe That The Best Policy Solutions Lie In The Center Ground, Then I Want To See, How Does The Center Revitalize Itself? How Does It Develop The Policy Agenda For The Future? And How Do We Link Up People Who Have The Same Basic Ideas And Attachments To The Same Basic Values Across The World?

The Best Philanthropy Is Not Just About Giving Money But Giving Leadership. The Best Philanthropists Bring The Gifts That Made Them Successful-the Drive, The Determination, The Refusal To Accept That Something Can't Be Done If It Needs To Be Into Their Philanthropy.

Yes, I Feel I've Got Something To Say. If People Want To Listen, That's Great, And If They Don't, That's Their Choice.

Human Progress Has Never Been Shaped By Commentators, Complainers Or Cynics.

If You've Got Communities That Feel They've Been Left Behind, If You've Got - As You Do In Britain At The Moment, You Have Communities That Believe They're Being Changed By Immigration, That They Don't Have Job Opportunities, And That They're Disregarded And That They Don't - They've Got No Stake In A Future Which Embraces Globalization, You've Got To Address That Issue.

I Think The Center Ground Have Got To Become The People Of Change Again And Not The Guardians Of The Status Quo. And That Is The Weakness It Comes To In Our Campaign. You Can See It In Your Politics, You Can See It Everywhere.

I Had Discovered Long Ago The First Lesson Of Political Courage: To Think Anew. I Had Then Learned The Second: To Be Prepared To Lead And To Decide. I Was Now Studying The Third: How To Take The Calculated Risk. I Was Going To Alienate Some People, Like It Or Not. The Moment You Decide, You Divide.

If We Are Going To Carry On Growing, And We Will, Because No Country Is Going To Forfeit Its Right To Economic Growth, We Have To Find A Way Of Doing It Sustainably.

I Have Never Pretended To Be A Great House Of Commons Man, But I Pay The House The Greatest Compliment I Can By Saying That, From First To Last, I Never Stopped Fearing It.

I Cannot Think Of Any Circumstances In Which A Government Can Go To War Without The Support Of Parliament.

We Are All Internationalists Now, Whether We Like It Or Not...

Most Of The Problems Of Government Come From People Being Overwhelmed By The Size And Scale Of What They Have To Do.

The Threat From Saddam Hussein And Weapons Of Mass Destruction - Chemical, Biological, Potentially Nuclear Weapons Capability - That Threat Is Real.

Mass Destruction

You Choose Your Own Reality And You - Social Media Then Amplifies Those Conspiracy Theories. So That's Why I Say Social Media Is Itself A Revolutionary Phenomenon.

In April 1991, After The Gulf War, Iraq Was Given 15 Days To Provide A Full And Final Declaration Of All Its Wmd.

The Spanish Pm Rang Me To Say: 'i Have The Support Of Only 4 Per Cent Of The People.' I Said, 'crikey, That's Even Less Than Think Elvis Presley Is Still Alive.'

Enough Of Talking: It Is Time Now To Do.

If What The Science Tells Us About Climate Change Is Correct, Then Unabated It Will Result In Catastrophic Consequences For Our World.

Sometimes It Is Better To Lose And Do The Right Thing Than To Win And Do The Wrong Thing.

Leaders Lead But In The End It's The People Who Deliver.

It Is Not A Sensible Or Intelligent Response For Us In Europe To Ridicule American Arguments And Parody Their Political Leadership.

Repressive States Are Developing Weapons That Could Cause Destruction On A Massive Scale.

Immigration Was Probably The Driving Thing Behind Brexit.

She Was The People's Princess And That Is How She Will Stay, How She Will Remain In Our Hearts And Our Memories For Ever.

In Retrospect, The Millennium Marked Only A Moment In Time. It Was The Events Of September 11 That Marked A Turning Point In History, Where We Confront The Dangers Of The Future And Assess The Choices Facing Humankind.

If You Are Trying To Take A Difficult Decision And You're Weighing Up The Pros And Cons, You Have Frank Conversations. Everybody Knows This In Their Walk Of Life.

If You're Living In A Community That's Become Fragmented And Left Behind, There's Not Proper Investment In It And So On, In The End, The Answer Is To Make Sure That We Go And We Help Those Communities, We Educate The People Properly, We Build The Necessary Infrastructure Of Support For People.

Where Radical Islamism Is Going To Be A Factor, It's Going To Be Very, Very Tough.

Some May Belittle Politics, But We Know - Who Are Engaged In It - That It Is Where People Stand Tall. And, Although I Know It Has Its Many Harsh Contentions, It Is Still The Arena That Sets The Heart Beating A Little Faster. And If It Is, On Occasions, The Place Of Low Skulduggery, It Is More Often The Place For The Pursuit Of Noble Causes.

I'm One Of These People That, Once You Have Had Your Election And You Have Elected Your Candidate, Let's See What Actually Happens.

One Thing, Change, Is What Everyone Says. The Question Is, What Type Of Change? What's The Right Change To Produce A Different Outcome For The People Left Behind By Globalization?

Sovereignty Rests With Me As An English Mp And That's The Way It Will Stay.

Be A Doer And Not A Critic.

If I'd Proposed Solving The Pension Problem By Compulsory Euthanasia For Every Fifth Pensioner I'd Have Got Less Trouble For It.

I Actually Did Trouble To Read Marx First Hand. I Found It Illuminating In So Many Ways; In Particular, My Perception Of The Relationship Between People And The Society In Which They Live Was Irreversibly Altered.

Fifteen Years Ago, If You Said Business Will Help Save The Environment People Would Have Laughed At You. Today, I Believe That Is A Serious Proposition.

This Is Not A Battle Between The United States Of America And Terrorism, But Between The Free And Democratic World And Terrorism.

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John Paul Jones

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E. Stanley Jones

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