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We Are Moving In Exactly The Wrong Direction In Higher Education. Forty Years Ago, Tuition In Some Of The Great American Public Universities And Colleges Was Virtually Free. Today, The Cost Is Unaffordable For Many Working Class Families. Higher Education Must Be A Right For All - Not Just Wealthy Families.

-Bernie Sanders

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Bernie Sanders

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We Are Moving In Exactly The Wrong Direction In Higher Education. Forty Years Ago, Tuition In Some Of The Great American Public Universities And Colleges Was Virtually Free. Today, The Cost Is Unaffordable For Many Working Class Families. Higher Education Must Be A Right For All - Not Just Wealthy Families.

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Should A Small Business Or A Large Business Be Able To Pollute The Water Or The Air Or The Food? No, I Hope You Don't Believe That.

I Want To Know In This Day And Age, Whether It Is Possible For Any Candidate Who Is Not A Billionaire Or Who Is Not Beholden To The Billionaire Class, To Be Able To Run Successful Campaigns.

Ever Since [donald]trump Has Been Opening His Big Mouth, You`re Seeing All These Bitter People, Latent Racists Who Are Becoming Emboldened. You`re Seeing Some Ugly Stuff Happening Around This Country.

There Are Many Major Crises Facing Our Country. At The Top Of The List Is The Need To Overturn Citizens United. If Billionaires Are Able To Buy Elections And Elect Right-wing Candidates, There Is No Way We Will Ever Address Climate Change, College Education, Affordability, Job Creation, Raising The Minimum Wage And Taking On Wall Street.

I Think, Clearly, We Got To Work Closely With China To Resolve The Serious Problems We Have, And I Worry About Putin And His Military Adventurism In The Crimea And The Ukraine.

Do The Elected Officials In Washington Stand With Ordinary Americans - Working Families, Children, The Elderly, The Poor - Or Will The Extraordinary Power Of Billionaire Campaign Contributors And Big Money Prevail? The American People, By The Millions, Must Send Congress The Answer To That Question.

We Are Rapidly Moving Toward A Nation Of The Super-rich, By The Super-rich And For The Super-rich

I Worry Very, Very Much About An Isolated Country. That's What Makes Me Nervous. Russia Lives In The World. China Lives In The World. North Korea Is A Very, Very Strange Country Because It Is So Isolated, And I Do Feel That A Nation With Nuclear Weapons, They Have Got To Be Dealt With. Dealt With Effectively.

All That I Can Say Is That We Are Spending Far More Per Capita Than People In Any Other Country, And Our Health Care Outcomes Are In Many Cases Worse In Terms Of Life Expectancy, Infant Mortality And So Forth.

I Am A Fierce Supporter Of Planned Parenthood, Naral, And Gay Rights In This Country.

Social Security Is The Most Successful Government Program In Our Nation's History. We Are Not Going To Cut Social Security! We Are Going To Expand Social Security!

There Is Far Too Little Discussion In Washington About The Collapse Of The Middle Class , Almost No Discussion At All About The Incredible Income Inequality And Wealth Inequality In This Country, And The Fact That We're Moving Toward An Oligarch Form Of Society.

I Would Say That, You Know, Being Jewish, What Has Been Most Significant In My Life Is Understanding What A Hitler - What Horrible Politics Can Mean To People And I Think That's Been One Of The Motivating Factors In My Life In Fighting Against Racism And Bigotry Of All Kinds Because When It Gets Out Of Hand, As We Have Seen And We Are, You Know - It's Obviously Has Unbelievable Repercussions.

In My View, A Corporation Is Not A Person. A Corporation Does Not Have First Amendment Rights To Spend As Much Money As It Wants, Without Disclosure, On A Political Campaign.

As A Result Of The Digital Age And The Decline Of First-class Mail, There Is No Question That The Postal Service Must Change And Develop A New Business Model.

It's Immoral And Wrong That The Top 1 Percent Of The Usa Owns Almost As Much Wealth As The Bottom 90 Percent. We Should Look At Countries Like Denmark And Sweden And Norway And Look At What They've Accomplished For Their Working People.

I Think We Need To Take On The Greed Of The Billionaire Class, A Disastrous Campaign Finance System.

I Think The Democratic Party Has Got To Make Fundamental Choices.

I Will Do My Best To Transform Our Trade Policy And Take On These Corporations Who Want To Invest In Low-income Countries Around The World Rather Than In The United States Of America.

The Decision Is I'm Going To Do Everything I Can To Fight For The Working Class Of This Country, The Low-income People Against Income And Wealth Inequality, Do Everything We Can About Climate Change.

When You Have Kids That Have No Jobs And Are Not In School, Too Often They Get Themselves Into Trouble. So What We Have Got To Do Is Invest In Education And In Jobs, Something Which I Have Fought For, Rather Than More Jails And Incarceration.

Hillary Clinton Is On Record Supporting A Doubling Of Community Health Centers In This Country, Which Will Mean That Tens Of Millions Of People - Poor People - Will Have Access To Health Care That Do Not Have It Today. Is That Significant? It Is Very Significant.

In And Out Of Government, I've Always Been Willing To Take On Complicated, Sometimes Unpopular, Issues And Work Them Through To Have A Solution.

The U.s. Constitution Is An Extraordinary Document. In My View, It Should Not Be Amended Often.

I Was Elected By The Democrats To Be Chair Of The Veterans Committee, Which I'm Very Proud Of. And Now Am The Rankings Member On The Budget Committee, Leader Of The Democrats In Opposition To The Majority Republicans.

I Am On The Health Education Labor Committee. That Committee Wrote The Affordable Care Act. The Idea I Would Dismantle Health Care In America While We're Waiting To Pass A Medicare For All Is Just Not Accurate.

Health Education

This Is A War For The Soul Of Islam. And Those Countries Who Are Opposed To Islam, They Are Going To Have To Get Deeply Involved In A Way That Is Not The Case Today. We Should Be Supportive Of That Effort.

The American People, Whether You Are Democrat, Independent, Republican, Progressive, Conservative, Do Not Believe Corporations Are People Or That Corporations Should Be Able To Buy Elections.

What We Need To Do Is Lead An International Coalition Which Includes Very Significantly The Muslim Nations In That Region Who Are Going To Have To Fight And Defend Their Way Of Life.

Our Goal There, In My View, Is To Work And Lean Strongly On China To Put As Much Pressure. China Is One Of The Few Major Countries In The World That Has Significant Support For North Korea, And I Think We Got To Do Everything We Can To Put Pressure On China. I Worry Very Much About An Isolated, Paranoid Country With Atomic Bombs.

In 30 Years Of Public Service, I Have Had No Scandals. I Have High Ethical Standards. I Am Most Proud Of My Judgement, That Kind Of Judgement Is What We Want In A President Going Forward. I Want To Be A Peacemaker.

Ethical Standards

As A Single-payer Advocate, I Believe That At The End Of The Day, If A State Goes Forward And Passed An Effective Single-payer Program, It Will Demonstrate That You Can Provide Quality Health Care To Every Man, Woman And Child In A More Cost-effective Way.

This Is A Very Important Issue That The Corporate Media Chooses Not To Talk About A Whole Lot, That We Have An Economic System Which Is Rigged, Which Means That At The Same Time As The Middle Class Of This Country Is Disappearing, Almost All Of The New Income And Wealth In America Is Going To The Top 1 Percent. You Have The Top One-tenth Of 1 Percent Owning Almost As Much Wealth As The Bottom 90 Percent - 58 Percent Of All New Income Is Going To The Top 1 Percent.

Black People Are Dying In This Country Because We Have A Criminal Justice System Which Is Out Of Control, A System In Which Over 50% Of Young African American Kids Are Unemployed. It Is Estimated That A Black Baby Born Today Has A One In Four Chance Of Ending Up In The Criminal Justice System.

I Think What You've Got Are Millions Of People Who Are In Trouble Today. They Really Are. They're Confused. They're Working Longer Hours For Lower Wages. They're Seeing Productivity Going Up But Their Kids Are Worse Off Economically Than They Are. They're Looking At A Campaign Finance System In Politics And They See Corruption, Big Money Buying Elections. Nobody In Congress Is Listening To Them.

Setting Aside Labels, I Am Somebody Who Believes That Government In A Democratic Society Should Be Representing The Needs Of The Vast Majority Of The People Who Are Middle-class And Working Families.

What Wall Street And Credit Card Companies Are Doing Is Really Not Much Different From What Gangsters And Loan Sharks Do Who Make Predatory Loans. While The Bankers Wear Three-piece Suits And Don't Break The Knee Caps Of Those Who Can't Pay Back, They Still Are Destroying People's Lives.

One Can't Predict The Future, That Maybe Our Training And Their Fighting Capabilities Are Improving And We Are Going To Make Some Progress In Destroying Isis.

I Wanna End The International Embarrassment Of The United States Of America Being The Only Major Country On Earth That Doesn't Guarantee Health Care To All People As A Right, Not A Privilege.

The Combat [with Isis] On The Ground Must Be Done By Muslim Troops With Our Support. We Must Not Get Involved In Perpetual Warfare In The Middle East.

We Need The Best Educated Workforce In The World. Hundreds Of Thousands Of Bright, Young, Qualified People Who Want To Go To College Or Get A Higher Education Are Unable To Do So, Not Because They Lack The Ability But Because They Lack The Money.

The Democratic Party Has Been Very Strong In A Lot Of Areas, In Fighting To Make Our Country A Less Discriminatory Country. And That Is Enormously Important.

I Believe Strongly That We Can Protect Our People Without Undermining Our Constitutional Rights And I Worry Very, Very Much About The Huge Attacks On Privacy That We Have Seen In Recent Years - Both From The Government And The Private Sector. I Worry That We Are Moving Toward An Orwellian Society, And This Is Something I Will Oppose As Vigorously As I Can.

As The Nation At Last Confronts Global Warming, It Is No Time For Denial, Greed, Cynicism Or Pessimism.

Whether It Is Television, Radio, Newspapers, Magazines, Books Or The Internet, A Few Giant Conglomerates Are Determining What We See, Hear And Read.

What My Campaign Is About Is A Political Revolution - Millions Of People Standing Up And Saying, Enough Is Enough. Our Government Belongs To All Of Us, And Not Just The Hand Full Of Billionaires.

Political Revolution

I Don't Want To Get People Nervous Falling Off Their Chairs, But Social Security Is A Socialist Program. It's A Program By Which The United States Government Has Said That When You Get Old You Should Have A Steady Source Of Income.

The Good News Is That The American People, Not Just The African-american Community Are Saying Enough Is Enough. You Can`t Hold People In Custody And Suddenly Find Out That They Are Dead. You Can`t Shoot People In The Back.

African American

Giving Up Is Not An Option If We Want To Prevent Irreparable Harm To Our Planet.

Irreparable Harm

As A Nation, There Are Many Issues We Don`t Talk About, We Just Don`t Talk About, Push Them Under The Rug. Poverty Is One Of Those Issues.

I Am Very Proud Of The Campaign We Ran And The Supporters That Came On Board.

You All Remember How Many Years Ago, We Were Younger, It Was Uppity Women Who Are Trying To Take Our Jobs As Men. It Was Those Gay People Who Wanted To Make Everybody Homosexual In Our School System. It Was Blacks Wanted To Take White Jobs. That's What Demagoguery Is About. It Is To Obfuscate The Real Problems Facing Our Society And Find Somebody You Can Blame And Rally The American People.

We Still Have People In The Active Duty, And If People Are Feeling Ill, If They're Experiencing Various Symptoms And They're Still In The Active Duty, They're Less Likely To Come Forward Because That Could Result In Their Medical Discharge.

We Have Got To Make Sure That Every Qualified American In This Country Who Wants To Go To College Can Go To College -- Regardless Of Income.

What The People Here Have Said Is That Given The Enormous Crises Facing Our Country, It Is Just Too Late For The Same Old, Same Old Establishment Politics And Establishment Economics.

In Fact, Climate Change Is Directly Related To The Growth Of Terrorism.

I Do Not Believe That We Must Maintain A Bloated Military Budget Which Spends Almost As Much As The Rest Of The World Combined And May Lead Us To Perpetual Warfare In The Middle East.

The Fossil Fuel Industry For Too Long Has Shifted Enormous Costs Of Carbon Pollution Onto The Public.

It Reminds Me In Some Ways Of The Debate Taking Place In This Country And Around The World In The Late 1930s. There Were People, In This Congress, In The British Parliament Saying, 'don't Worry! Hitler's Not Real! It'll Disappear'.

We Can`t Allow Racism And Xenophobia To Gain Traction.

I Happen To Believe That We Should Move To A Medicare-for-all Single-payer System, Similar To What Other Countries Around The World Have.

Everyone Can Have Health Care. Everyone Can Earn A Living Wage. We Can Educate All Our Kids - Well. But None Of That Happens Unless There's A Political Revolution. And It's Not Going To Happen Unless We Deal With Corporate Control Of The Media.

Political Revolution

It's Not Something Where You Can Say, One Time You Said This And Now You Said This. That Doesn't Peel Off Any Of His People. The Only Way That You Can Do It Is By Out Alphaing [doanld] Trump, And I Think That's What Marco Rubio's Attempting To Do.

We Need A Growing Middle Class, Not One That Has Been Disappearing For 40 Years. We Need A Vibrant One Person-one Vote Democracy, Not One Which Is Dominated By Billionaire Campaign Contributors. It's Time For A Political Revolution. It's Time To Make Our Government Work For All Of Us, And Not Just The 1%.

Political Revolution

Can I Work With Corporations? Are There Good Corporations Doing Incredible Cutting Edge Research And Development? Absolutely They Are. And We Should Be Proud Of Them.

Research And Development

Here's Something That I Believe We Have To Do As We Put Together An International Coalition, And That Is We Have To Understand That The Muslim Nations In The Region - Saudi Arabia, Iran, Turkey, Jordan - All Of These Nations, They're Going To Have To Get Their Hands Dirty, Their Boots On The Ground. They Are Going To Have To Take On Isis.

Let Us Wage A Moral And Political War Against The Billionaires And Corporate Leaders, On Wall Street And Elsewhere, Whose Policies And Greed Are Destroying The Middle Class Of America.

If We Are A Free Country, We Have The Right To Be Free.

We Have To Transform Our Energy System.

In Germany, Many Other Countries, College Tuition Is Free. Why Isn`t Free In America? Why Do We Have The Highest Rate Of Childhood Poverty When Other Countries Have Rates Much Lower Than We Have? Why Don`t We Have Pay Equity For Women Workers? Why Aren`t We Leading The World In Transforming Our Energy System In Terms Of Climate Change? We Can Do That. Are We Dumb? Are We Lazy? Not The Case.

Republicans Win When People Are Demoralized And You Have A Small Voter Turnout, Which By The Way Is Why They Love Voter Suppression. I Believe That Our Campaign Up To Now Has Shown That We Can Create An Enormous Amount Of Enthusiasm From Working People, From Young People, Who Will Get Involved In The Political Process And Which Will Drive Us To A Very Large Voter Turnout.

Brothers And Sisters: Now Is Not The Time For Thinking Small, Now Is Not The Time For The Same-old, Same-old Establishment Politics And Stale Inside-the-beltway Ideas.

When You Look At Somebody Like A Netanyahu, To Simply Not Understand That This Is A Right-wing Politician, A Guy Who Kind Of Crashed The United States Congress To Give His Speech There, Ignoring President Obama, Not Even Consulting With Him, Using It For Political Purposes Back Home, A Guy Who Has Supported The Youth - The Growth Of Settlement, I Think The - The Overreaction And The Destruction Of Gaza Went Too, Too Far. Israel Should Not Be Bombing Schools Or Homes, Just Terrible Damage There.

I Have Taken On Virtually Every Element Of The Big Money Establishment, Whether It's The Koch Brothers, And The Big Energy Companies, Whether It's The Industrial Complex, Whether It's Wall Street... I Have Taken On The Drug Companies. I Have Taken On The Insurance Companies.

The Tpp Is Another Corporate-backed Agreement That Is The Latest In A Series Of Trade Policies Which Have Cost Us Millions Of Decent-paying Jobs, Pushed Down Wages For American Workers And Led To The Decline Of Our Middle Class. We Want American Companies To Create Decent-paying Jobs In America, Not Just Low-wage Countries Like Vietnam, Malaysia Or China. The Tpp Must Be Defeated.

I Talked To A Lot Of Black Lives Activists In Various States. What I Learned Is That The Relationship Of Police Departments Around The Country With The Black Community Is Far, Far More Severe And Awful Than I Had Originally Known.

People Have A Right To Give A Speech. And People Have A Right To Protest. But I'm Not A Great Fan Of Disrupting People's Speeches.

If You Take Donations From Wall Street, You Can't Be Independent.

When People Get Out Of Jail, It Is Not Easy For Them To Find A Job. It Is Not Easy For Them To Return To Civil Society.

Why Is It That Two-thirds Of White, Rural Men Voted Republican? Why? That's What We Have To Address. That's Crazy. These People Are Working Longer And Longer Hours.

I Think It's Important That Members Of The United States Senate Spend Time Not Just On Capitol Hill But Making Contact With Ordinary People And Engaging Them In The Political Process.

Establishing A 0.03 Percent Wall Street Speculation Fee, Similar To What We Had From 1914-1966, Would Dampen The Dangerous Level Of Speculation And Gambling On Wall Street, Encourage The Financial Sector To Invest In The Productive Economy And Reduce The Deficit By More Than $350 Billion Over 10 Years.

I Do Believe That We Should Substantially Lower Student Debt In This Country, Which Is Crushing Millions Of People. We Pay For It, In My View, By A Tax On Wall Street Speculation. The Middle Class Bailed Out Wall Street In Their Time Of Need. Now, It Is Wall Street's Time To Help The Middle Class.

One In Four Corporations Doesn't Pay Any Taxes.

Education Should Be A Right, Not A Privilege. We Need A Revolution In The Way That The United States Funds Higher Education.

I Think The Immediate Thing Is We Stand Up To Protect Those People Who Are In Trouble.

We Can Have Paid Family And Medical Leave. We Can Make Public Colleges And Universities Tuition-free. These Are Not Revolutionary, Radical Ideas. They're Kind Of Common Sense.

The Message Is Resonating, Not Just In Wisconsin, But All Over America, The People Are Sick And Tired Of Establishment Politics, Establishment Economics. They Want Real Change.

Now, Why Would My Supporters Be Supporting Somebody Who Doesn't Want To Raise The Federal Minimum Wage Of $7.25 An Hour, A Starvation Wage, Doesn't Want To Do That. Why Would Anybody That Supports Me Support A Candidate Like Trump Who Wants To Throw Millions And Millions Of People Off Of Health Insurance? We Need To Guarantee Health Care To All People As A Right, Not Throw Millions Of People Off Health Insurance As Trump Wants To Do.

I Do Believe That In The Future, Not By Dismantling What We Have Here - I Helped Write That Bill - But By Moving Forward, Rallying The American People, I Do Believe We Should Have Health Care For All.

I Think What The Secretary Hillary Clinton Has Recognized Is The American People Are Extremely Angry About The Power Of Wall Street, The Greed, The Illegal Behavior Of Wall Street.

I Don't Want To See Kids In America Being Scared Because They're Hearing People On Television And The Radio Saying Really Ugly Xenophobic And Racist Things.

Instead Of Talking About Cuts In Social Security, Medicare And Medicaid, We Must End The Absurdity Of Corporations Not Paying A Nickel In Federal Income Taxes.

Medicare And Medicaid

Health Care In America Must Be A Right, Not A Privilege.

The Case To Be Made Is That We Have Got To Get People Involved - Continue To Get People Involved In The Political Process At Every Level.

No. It Is Not Acceptable That The 6 Largest Financial Institutions In This Country Have Assets Of Almost 10 Trillion Dollars, And Issue Half Of The Mortgages And Two-thirds Of The Credit Cards. That Is Too Much Wealth And Power In The Hands Of A Few. If Teddy Roosevelt Were Alive Today He'd Tell Us To 'break Them Up.' And He'd Be Right. These Huge Banks Must Be Broken Up.

I Think If We're Looking At Lasting Peace In The Middle East, The United States Has Got To Respect The Needs Of The Palestinian People. They Cannot Be Pushed Aside.

The United States Must Lead The World In Reversing Climate Change. We Can Do That.

We Have Two And Half Million Individual Campaign Contributions, More Than Any Campaign In History.

There Is Something Fundamentally Wrong About The Way We [americans] Are Moving As A Country, When Billionaires Are Able To Buy Elections As A Result Of Citizens United. There`s Something Fundamentally Wrong When 99 Percent Of All New Income Goes To The Top 1 Percent.

I Do Not Accept The Belief That The United States Of America And Our Government Can't Stand Up To The Ripoffs Of The Pharmaceutical Industry Which Charge Us By Far The Highest Prices In The World For Prescription Drugs.

It's Time To Make Our Government Work For All Of Us... And Not Just The 1%.

Government Work

I'm Not Much Into Speculation.

In America, We Have Struggled Too Much, Too Long As A Country Trying To Overcome Racism And Sexism And Homophobia. We Cannot Go Back To A More Discriminatory Society.

I Want Trump To Send Out A Tweet Saying That He's Going To Keep His Campaign Promises. He's Not Going To Cut Social Security, Medicare And Medicaid.

Medicare And Medicaid

If You Are Not Prepared Top Take Care Of The Men And Women Who Put Their Lives On The Line To Defend This Country - Who Came Back Wounded In Body, Wounded In Spirit - If You're Not Prepared To Help Those People, Then Don't Send Them To War In The First Place.

I Am Proud Of The Campaign That We Ran. Obviously, I Wish We Could Have Done A Little Bit Better.

We Have To Invest In Our Kids, We Have To Invest In Our Communities, We Have To Create Jobs. We Have To Make Certain That Kids Are Not Dropping Out Of School And Hanging Out On Street Corners.

I'm Running For President, Because As I Go Around This Nation, I Talk To A Lot Of People. And What I Hear Is People's Concern That The Economy We Have Is A Rigged Economy.

Together, Leading The World, The U.s.a. Will Rid Our Planet Of This Barbarous Organization Called Isis.

I Am Not A Great Fan Of The Payroll Tax Holiday Because I'm Nervous About What It Does To The Future Of Social Security.

The Middle Class In America Is At A Tipping Point. It Will Not Last Another Generation If We Don't Boldly Change Course Now.

Black Lives, Of Course, Matter. I Spent 50 Years Of My Life Fighting For Civil Rights And For Dignity, But If You Don't Want Me To Be Here, That's Ok. I Don't Want To Out-scream People.

I'm Not Going To Get Establishment Support. I'm Not Going To Get The Support Of The Governors And The Senators, With Few Exceptions, And Many Of The Major Organizations.

I Worry Very Much About Kids Growing Up In A Society Where They Think: "i'm Not Going To Talk About This Issue, Read This Book Or Explore This Idea Because Someone May Think I'm A Terrorist." That's Not The Kind Of Free Society I Want For Our Children.

I Come From A State That Has Virtually No Gun Control. And Yet, At Political Peril, I Voted For An Instant Background Check, Which I Want To See Strengthened And Expanded. I Voted To Ban Certain Types Of Assault Weapons Which Are Designed Only To Kill People.

Assault Weapons

Let Us Wage A Moral And Political War Against War Itself, So That We Can Cut Military Spending And Use That Money For Human Needs.

Climate Change Is Real, It Is Caused By Human Activity, And It Is Already Causing Devastating Problems In America And Around The World.

So As A Nation, We Have A Right To Be Very Proud Of The Successes That We Have Seen Because Of The Struggle Of Millions Of People To Create A Less Discriminatory Society. That Is Something We Should Be Proud Of, But There Is One Struggle In Which Not Only Have We Not Succeeded But In Which We Are Losing Ground And That Is The Fundamental Struggle For Economic Justice.

At A Time Of Massive Inequality, I Think We Can Raise Substantial Sums Of Revenue To Address The Needs Of Working Families, The Elderly, And The Children, By Asking Those People Who Are Doing Phenomenally Well To Start Paying Their Fair Share.

Here's What Income And Wealth Inequality Is About. Last Year, The Top 25 Hedge Fund Managers Made More Than 24 Billion, Enough To Pay The Salaries Of 425,000 Public School Teachers. This Level Of Inequality Is Neither Moral Or Sustainable

I Do Believe That Billionaires And Multi-millionaires Should Be Paying More In Taxes.

I Surely Remember Being In The Administration Building Sitting In Long Sleepless Nights And Working With Young People To Do The Right Thing. And That Is To Tell Our University, At That Time, The University Of Chicago, That It Was Wrong To Own And Maintain Segregated Housing. I Remember It Very Well.

The Light Bulb Going Off In My Head Was A Fear That In This Pivotal Moment In History, When America Faces So Many Serious Problems, When The Middle Class And Working Class Of This Country Are Being Decimated, That There Were Not Voices Out There Representing The Tens Of Millions Of People Who Needed A Voice. And The Idea Of Going Through A Campaign Where There Is Not A Serious Discussion About The Most Important Issues Facing America, Where There Are Not Voices Out There Representing People Who Are Hurting - That Seemed To Me Unacceptable.

Washington Is Dominated By Big Money.

I Think People Cast Their Votes For A Number Of Reasons. I Think If You Look At Your Polls, You'll Probably Find That Many, Many People Think That Our Views Are Closer To What They Believe The Future Of America Should Be. That Our Views Are Closer On Economic Issues. And A Lot Of Those Polls Come Down To Demographics, To Age, To How Much Money You Are Making.

I Am The Longest- Serving Independent In The History Of The United States Congress. People Of Vermont Sent Me To Washington As An Independent. That Is True.

But On The Other Hand, There Are Many Corporations Who Have Turned Their Backs On The American Worker, Who Have Said, If I Can Make Another Nickel In Profit By Going To China And Shutting Down In The United States Of America, That's What I Will Do.

The United States Has Got To Join The Rest Of The Industrialized World In Making Sure That Working Families Of The Middle Class Have Benefits That They Absolutely Need. We Are The Only Major Country On Earth That Does Not Guarantee Health Care To All People As A Right. We Are The Only Major Country On Earth That Does Not Provide Paid Family And Medical Leave. There Are Many Countries Around The World Which Make Sure That Public Colleges And Universities Are Tuition-free. In Our Country, It's Becoming Increasingly Difficult To Afford To Go To College.

It's Time For The Supreme Court To Catch Up To The American People And Legalize Gay Marriage.

The Focus, To My Mind, Is To Make Sure That Donald Trump Does Not Become President Of The United States. I Think By Temperament He Is Unqualified To Be President. I Think His Views - You Have A Guy Who's Running For President Who Rejects Science, Doesn't Even Believe Climate Change Is Real, Let Alone Wants To Do Something About It, Wants To Give Hundreds Of Billions Of Dollars In Tax Breaks To The Top Two-tenths Of One Percent.

Country Must Confront What He Called Institutional Racism. [we Should] Create A Country Which Provides Economic, Social And Environmental Justice For All.

Justice For All

We Must Never Allow Demagogues To Divide Us Up By Race, By Religion, By National Origin, By Gender, Or Sexual Orientation. Black And Whites, Latino, Asian-american, Native American, Christian, Jew, Muslim, And Every Religion - Straight Or Gay, Male Or Female - We Must Stand Together. This Country Belongs To All Of Us.

Native American

I'm Not A Democrat, I'm An Independent, But I Caucus With The Democrats.

The Only Way Change Happens Is When People Become More Significantly Involved In The Political Process. We Have To Increase Voter Turnout And Citizen Participation So That People Know What's Going On And Demand A Government That Works For Everybody And Not Just The One Percent.

Subsidies For The Oil, Gas And Coal Industries Are Projected To Cost Taxpayers More Than $135 Billion In The Coming Decade. At A Time When Scientists Tell Us We Need To Reduce Carbon Pollution To Prevent Catastrophic Climate Change, It Is Absurd To Provide Massive Subsidies That Pad Fossil-fuel Companies' Already Enormous Profits.

It's No Great Secret, Number One, In My View, And I Think The View Of Most Americans, That Congress Itself Is Pretty Dysfunctional. We Are Not Addressing The Real Needs Of The American People. And Second Of All, Philosophically, There Is A Huge Division Between The House And The Senate.

Many People Can Talk For A Long Period Of Time. But Controlling, You Know, Your Urinary Tract Is Maybe The More Difficult Issue.

Now Is The Time To Alter Our Government. Now Is The Time To Stop The Movement Toward Oligarchy. Now Is The Time To Create A Government Which Represents All Americans And Not Just The 1%... No More Excuses. We Must All Become Involved In The Political Process.

People All Over This Country Are Shouting At Each Other. And What We Need To Do Is Bring People Together To Work On The Agreement Where There Is Broad Consensus And That's What I Intend To Do.

Don't Stay In One Place For Eight Or Nine Hours.

It Is Not Good Enough To Say, "well, Hey, I Vote Every Two Years. I Vote Every Four Years." That's Fine, But That Is Not Good Enough.

Not Good Enough

The Billionaires And Their Super Pacs Increasingly Control The American Political Process. This Is Not Democracy. This Is Not What Brave Americans Fought And Died To Defend. This Is Oligarchy. This Is Government Of The Few, By The Few And For The Few. We Must Overturn Citizen United And Move To Public Funding Of Elections.

I Will Tell You Is The Antidote To [donald] Trump Is A Very Strong Progressive Agenda That Says, Yes, I Know You`re Angry. And You Know What? You Should Be Angry Because You`re Working Longer Hours For Low Wages. You Have A Right To Be Bitter And You Have A Right To Be That.

Today, The United States Is No. 1 In Corporate Profits, No. 1 In Ceo Salaries, No. 1 In Childhood Poverty And No. 1 In Income And Wealth Inequality In The Industrialized World.

We Have Got To Change The Political Culture In America. We Need A Political Revolution. That Means We Are Working On Politics Not Just Three Weeks Before An Election But 365 Days A Year.

Political Revolution

Low-income People, Racial Or Ethnic Minorities, Pregnant Women, Seniors, People With Special Needs, People In Rural Areas - They All Have A Much Harder Time Accessing A Dentist Than Other Groups Of Americans.

This Is America, And We Are Not Going To Throw Out 11 Million People In This Country Who Are Undocumented. We`re Not Going To Turn Against One Of The Largest Religions In The World, People Who Are Muslim. I Do Not Want To See Muslim Kids, Who Feel Intimidated In The Country And Frightened, Living In The Country Where They Grew Up. That Is Not America. We Do Not Want To Continue The Attacks Against The Women.

In Terms Of Iran And In Terms Of Saudi Arabia, Of Course They Hate Each Other. That's No Great Secret. But John Kerry, Who Is I Think Doing A Very Good Job, Has Tried To At Least Get These People In The Room Together Because Both Of Them Are Being Threatened By Isis.

The Middle Class Is Collapsing And We Are Moving Toward An Oligarchic Form Of Society, Where The Billionaires Will Control The Economy And The Political Life Of The Country.

When The Average Social Security Benefit Is $1328 A Month, And More Than One-third Of Our Senior Citizens Rely On Social Security For Virtually All Of Their Income, Our Job Is To Expand Benefits, Not Cut Them.

Debating, Doubting, Or Rejecting The Basic Scientific Facts About Climate Change In The Face Of The Overwhelming Evidence And Overwhelming Scientific Opinion Will Not Change Those Facts.

For Better Or Worse, When Sen. Inhofe Speaks, The Republican Party Follows. And When The Republican Party Follows, It Is Impossible To Get Real Work Done In The Congress.

I Think, In My Own State, I Can Tell You That People Do Want To Hear A Serious Discussion On Serious Issues.

People Are Hungry, And They're Hurting And They're Very, Very Worried About Their Children. Will Their Kids Ever Pay Off Their Student Debt? Will Their Kids Ever Get A Decent-paying Job? I Think Democrats Have Got To Be Running A Grass-roots Campaign - Mobilizing People And Being Prepared To Take On The 1 Percent With An Agenda That Speaks To The Needs Of Ordinary Workers.

We're Not Going To Give Tax Breaks To Billionaires And Then Cut Back On The Needs Of Our Elderly Or Poor Or Kids Or Education. We're Not Going To Privatize Social Security - In Fact, We're Going To Strengthen It. We're Going To Provide Quality Education For Every Kid In America, From Preschool Through College. We Have To Take On These Corporate Leaders Who Are Selling Out The American People, Whose Allegiance Is Now Much More To China Than It Is To The United States. If We Have The Courage To Take These People On, I Think We Can Overwhelm George W. Bush And His Friends.

We Need To Change The Power Structure In America, We Need To End The Political Oligarchy.

I Did Work With John Mccain. I Did Work With Jeff Miller Over In The House. And We Put Together Not The Bill That I Wanted, But Probably The Most Comprehensive V.a. Health Care Bill In The Modern History Of This Country.

I Would Like To See Somebody Who Speaks For The Underdog, For The People Who Don`t Have This In Healthcare Benefits. So I Would Like To See A Candidate Who Has The Guts To Opposition That America Could Be A Land For All People, Not Just The Land Control By The Super Rich.

If You Can't Afford To Take Care Of Your #‎ Veterans , Then Don't Go To War.

We've Had A Number Of Economists Supporting Our Legislation. And Here's Where We Are. The American People Can Judge. Six Largest Financial Institutions In America Today Have Assets Of Roughly $10 Trillion; Equivalent To 58 Percent Of The Gdp Of The United States Of America.

I Think You Have An Enormous Amount Of Fear And Uncertainty In This Country. And It`s Not Just From San Bernardino Or From Paris.

I Want To Applaud Those Workers Rallying To Raise The Minimum Wage To $15 Per Hour. I Believe Strongly That A Great Nation Will Not Survive When So Few Have So Much And So Many Have So Little. Every Worker In America Should Be Given Respect, Dignity And The Wages And Benefits They Need To Take Care Of Their Family.

The Billionaires Pay An Effective Tax Rate Lower Than Nurses Or Truck Drivers. That Makes No Sense At All. There Has To Be Real Tax Reform, And The Wealthiest And Large Corporations Will Pay.

We Live In A Country Where A Small Number Of People Have Incredible Wealth And Power. America Has More Income And Wealth Inequality Than Any Other Major Country.

The Truth Is That Political Consciousness In This Country Is Pretty Low... To The Degree That We Can Help Educate And Organize People Around The Most Important Issues Facing Their Lives And Show That There Is Support For Fundamental Changes In The Way We Do Business In The United States Of America In Terms Of Income Inequality, In Terms Of Low Wages, In Terms Of Disastrous Trade Policies, In Terms Of Being The Only Major Country Not To Have A National Healthcare Program - That's Success.

If We Greatly Expanded Primary Health Care, Lower The Cost Of Prescription Drugs, We Take A Giant Step Forward In Lowering Health Care Costs In America.

Real Change Never Occurs From The Top On Down, [but] Always From The Bottom On Up.

As The Longest Serving Independent In The History Of The United States Congress, As Somebody Who Came Into Office By Defeating An Incumbent Democratic Mayor In Burlington, Vermont, I Know Something About Third Party Politics. And I Respect Jill [stein].

I Think Katrina Is One More Indication Of How Inefficient And Corrupt This Administration Is, And Indicates The Absolute Lack Of Seriousness That [george W.] Bush Has In Making The Government Respond To The Needs Of The People. They Are So Separated From The Lives Of Normal, Low-income People That It Never Occurred To Them That If You're Poor And Have No Money, No Car, That You Can't Leave.

No President, Not The Smartest, Best Human Being In The World Can Do It Alone. You Cannot Take On This, The Power That Is In Washington, To Billionaires And Lobbyist, The Military Industrial Complex, All Of This Money And Power, You Can`t Do It. You Need A Mass Movement Of American Who Are Looking In Congress And We Say Directly.

The Reality Is We That Have A Corrupt Campaign Finance System Which Separates The American People's Needs And Desires From What Congress Is Doing. So To My Mind, What We Have Got To Do Is Wage A Political Revolution Where Millions Of People Have Given Up On The Political Process, Stand Up And Fight Back, Demand The Government That Represents Us And Not Just A Handful Of Campaign Contribution - Contributors.

When My Republican Colleagues Talk About Family Values, They Mean That A Woman Should Not Be Able To Have The Right To Control Her Own Body; That Women Should Not Be Able To Purchase The Contraceptives That They Want. Those Are Their Family Values, Not Our Family Values.

Demagogues Like [donald] Trump Come Along. He Says I Know What The Cause Is. Remember, Later, The Cause Was That Mexicans Who Are Coming To This Country, Well, They Were Criminals Or Rapists. Now It Is Muslims.

We Have To Enforce The Individual Mandate. We're Losing A Lot Of Money That Is Not Coming Into The System.

I Come From A Rural State. People Drive 50, 100 Miles To And From Work Every Single Day. That Is True All Over America.

We Are Spending Hundreds Of Billions Of Dollars Maintaining 5,000 Nuclear Weapons. I Think We Need Major Reform In The Military, Making It More Cost Effective, But Also Focusing On The Real Crisis That Faces America.

If You Looked At Jeb Bush's Campaign, It's More Than Just Money. It's The Nature Of The Candidate And The Message And All That Stuff.

I Think What The American People Are Saying Is Enough Is Enough. This Country, This Great Country, Belongs To All Of Us. It Cannot Continue To Be Controlled By A Handful Of Billionaires Who Apparently Want It All.

I Was Not A Great Student At The University Of Chicago. I Think That Is - The Record Will Bare Me Out. But I Spent A Lot Of Time Reading History, Sociology, Psychology - Reading Everything Except What I Was Supposed To Read For Class The Next Day.

In America, We Are Living In A Society Which Is Moving More And More Toward An Oligarchic Form Of Society Where Government Is Dominated Heavily By Big-money Interests.

We Know The Legislation That Passed The House. It Was The Worst Piece Of Legislation Frankly Against Working Class People That I Can Remember In My Political Life In The Congress.

Here Is What The Practical Impact Of Citizens United Means. What Citizens United Means Is That Corporations Call Hundreds Of Millions Of Dollars Into Television Ads, Radio Ads, And Other Forms Of Advertising To Defeat Those Candidates Who Stand Up And Take Them On.

In The 1980s And 1990s, Jack Welch, The Ceo Of General Electric, Laid Off Over 100,000 Employees. His Reward? When He Retired From Ge, He Received A Golden Parachute Of Over $400 Million Dollars. This Is The Kind Of Corporate Greed And Irresponsibility That Is Destroying The Middle Class And Must Be Ended.

Don`t Go To The Dark Side. Don`t Go Bashing Immigrants Or Muslims.

The American People In Congress Have Got To Ask Themselves A Very Simple Question. Why Are We The Only Major Country On Earth Not To Guarantee Health Care To All People As A Right?

I Believe That Climate Change Is The Great Global Crisis That We Face, Environmental Crisis. I Believe That If You're Serious About Climate Change, You Don't Encourage The Excavation And Transportation Of Very Dirty Oil.

Believe Me, Every American, Every Person In This Country, If I Have Anything To Say About It, Will Know Precisely What Is Going On With Social Security, Medicare And Medicaid, Because They Are Beginning To Appoint People Who Are Typical Right-wing Republicans Who Want To Privatize And Cut Social Security.

Let's Be Honest, Dental Care In America Is Extremely Expensive, Period.

Any Idiot, Especially One Who Is Prepared To Die, Who Has A Gun, Can Start Shooting Up People.

When I Was In The House For 16 Years, I Caucused With The Democrats.

I Voted Against The War In Iraq. I Voted Against The First Gulf War. I Think War Is The Last Resort - The Last Option Of A Great Military Power Like Us. I Think That We Need To Focus On Building Coalitions. Yes, Isis Must Be Destroyed. But It Should Be Destroyed By A Coalition Of Muslim Nations On The Ground With The Support Of The United States And The Other Major Powers In The Air And In Training The Troops There.

As An Independent, My Views, In Fact, Are A Little Bit Different Than Many Of My Democratic Colleagues.

The American People Understand That It Is Grotesquely Unfair - We Are A Society That Prides Itself On Fairness, That Prides Itself On Equal Opportunity, And People Are Looking Out And Seeing, Since The Great Recession Of 2008, 99 Percent Of All New Income Going To The Top 1 Percent.

I Think The American People In Many Cases Want To Transform Our Energy System.

There Is A Reason Why These People [from Wall Street] Are Putting Huge Amounts Of Money Into Our Political System. And In My View, It Is Undermining American Democracy And It Is Allowing Congress To Represent Wealthy Campaign Contributors And Not The Working Families Of This Country.

What I Saw In Baltimore Was Distressing And It Tells Me We Need Stronger Policies In This Country.

We Don`t Need To Drive Up The National Debt By Giving Tax Breaks To Millionaires And Billionaires.

The American People Must Make A Fundamental Decision. Do We Continue The 40-year Decline Of Our Middle Class And The Growing Gap Between The Very Rich And Everyone Else, Or Do We Fight For A Progressive Economic Agenda That Creates Jobs, Raises Wages, Protects The Environment And Provides Health Care For All?

I Understood That These Trade Agreements Were Going To Destroy The Middle Class Of This Country. I Led The Fight Against Us. That Is One Of The Major Differences That We Have.

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Richard M. Nixon

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