Political Quotes

“President Duderstadt, thank you all very much. Thank you for that warm welcome. I want to salute the president, salute Governor and Mrs. John Engler, Representatives of the Congress--Pursell, Upton, and Vander Jagt, and distinguished Regents, and especially I want to pay my respects to our fellow honorary degree recipients. Barbara and I are very grateful for this high honor. Before this, there wasn't one lawyer in the family, and now we have two. The last time I was in Ann Arbor, we commemorated John Kennedy's unveiling of the Peace Corps. And as your commencement program indicates, Lyndon Johnson introduced the Great Society in a University of Michigan commencement address. Today, I want to talk to you about this historic moment. Your commencement--your journey into the ``real world''--coincides with this nation's commencement into a world freed from cold war conflict and thrust into an era of cooperation and economic competition. The United States plays a defining role in the world. Our economic strength, our military power, and most of all, our national character brought us to this special moment. When our policies unleashed the economic expansion of the 1980's, we exposed forever the failures of socialism and reaffirmed our status as the world's greatest economic power. When we sent troops to the Gulf, we showed that we take principles seriously enough to risk dying for them. But there's another message. There's another message.…”