Quotes About Capitol Hill

#1. It would be great if politics were fact-based, but it is not, and it is surely not nuance-based. What works in a classroom or a think tank does not work on Capitol Hill or in the White House. Obama sometimes seems to be running the Brookings Institution, not the country.

Jon Meacham

#2. On Capitol Hill, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales raised his right hand, swore to tell the truth, and then everybody had a good laugh and went back to what they were doing.

Jay Leno

#3. Environmentalists hate sprawl - except when it comes to the size of their expansive pet legislation on Capitol Hill.

Michelle Malkin

#4. And the banks - hard to believe in a time when we're facing a banking crisis that many of the banks created - are still the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill. And they frankly own the place.

Dick Durbin

#5. It [Lincoln movie] had nothing to do with politics. It had nothing to do with holding a mirror up to the way we conduct our business on Capitol Hill. This was meant to be a story, a Lincoln portrait if you will. I think any time is the right time for a very compelling story, any time.

Steven Spielberg

#6. I came out of Capitol Hill. Well, that's just not an ordinary background for a writer of the ordinary American sort.

Gore Vidal

#7. Artists have really never had any representation on Capitol Hill, because it's not the nature of the artist to join together and make a unified presence. Those days kind of died in the '60s.

Sheryl Crow

#8. The richly cadenced prose is hypnotic, the research prodigious, the analysis acute, the mood spellbinding, and the cast of characters mythic in scale. I cannot conceive of a better book about Capitol Hill. An unforgettable, epic achievement in the art of biography.

Ron Chernow

#9. 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.

Bernie Sanders

#10. I am convinced that there are more threats to American liberty within the 10 mile radius of my office on Capitol Hill than there are on the rest of the globe.

Ron Paul

#11. I hate to tell you, but it's not always pretty up there on Capitol Hill and there have been other scandals as you know that have been more than simply naughty e-mails.

Tony Snow

#12. He believed there was nothing essentially unAmerican about greed or lust - hey, those qualities were encouraged everywhere from Wall Street to Capitol Hill.

Jeffery Deaver

#13. I guided my heap into the heart of Capitol Hill wondering for the first time in fourteen years what I could do to get money besides drive cabs or rob banks. Both occupations had their pros and cons. For instance, bank robbery isn't quite as dangerous as cab driving, but it pays better.

Gary Reilly

#14. Every Democrat on Capitol Hill professes to be a fiscal hawk.

Bob Beauprez

#15. Our U.S. audience is composed of globally-minded Americans, an elite category, the ones who do have passports, the decision-makers, senior ranks in the administration, senators on Capitol Hill.

Lionel Barber

#16. Capitol Hill is Israeli occupied territory.

Pat Buchanan

#17. At the White House, everybody works for the same person. They're all part of the same company. But on Capitol Hill, they're all independent contractors. They all work for themselves. That's a formula for getting news.

Bob Schieffer

#18. According to a Public Policy Polling survey, most Americans find lice and colonoscopies more appealing than Capitol Hill.

Ron Fournier

#19. On Capitol Hill, the Republican-controlled House voted mostly along party lines tonight to pass President Bush's federal budget blueprint. This includes his big tax cut plan, partly bankrolled, critics say, through cuts in many federal aid programs for children and education.

Dan Rather

#20. [On women in previously all-male fields:] I think it will change in a lot of workplaces. I'm not so sure it will ever change on Capitol Hill until more women are in powerful positions. Because this is the last plantation for men.

Andrea Mitchell

#21. Wind has the potential to produce many, many more jobs per kilowatt hour than coal. But the coal industry has tremendous political clout on Capitol Hill because of its alliance with the railroads and coal-burning utilities.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

#22. Congress, 535 commoditized temple monkeys pawing through the ruins of America in search of bribes. The bicameral whorehouse on Capitol Hill works like a vending machine. You put coins in the slot, select your law, and the desired legislation slides out.

Fred Reed

#23. The president is now having to deal with a Congress. He's never had to do that before. The president in the past, he has just done whatever he wanted. He had a big rubberstamp here up on Capitol Hill, whatever he wanted, they stamped OK. That's not the way it is now.

Harry Reid

#24. My favorite Congressional incongruity: ... Red State legislators galumphing from meeting to meeting in full pancake makeup. Estee Lauder may well make more money on Capitol Hill than in Beverly Hills.

Frank Bruni

#25. On Capitol Hill, House Republicans have been doing our part. We've been hard at work developing policies that will help empower all Americans. We're beginning to see results. We reduced taxes for everyone.

Dennis Hastert

#26. A lot of people on Capitol Hill don't want to talk to me.

Michael Moore

#27. I don't know if anybody can second-guess what they will do on Capitol Hill.

Montel Williams

#28. There is an expression here on Capitol Hill," Issa told me. "'Don't ever get between a member and a camera.'" That can be particularly harrowing in the case of Issa, who had purchased a T-shirt for Bardella that said: "It's all about me.

Mark Leibovich

#29. Can I give a little advice to the old man on Capitol Hill? Stop saying teabagger. Ask your younger staffers what it means.

Andrea Tantaros

#30. Obama's ability to use his personality to push folks, whether on Capitol Hill or in Europe, means that he has to stay popular. What happens if he loses that popular mandate?

Chuck Todd

#31. I walked to Seward School first through fourth grade. It's just amazing to me now that we'd walk down 10th Avenue on Capitol Hill.

Stone Gossard

#32. I opposed No Child Left Behind, I opposed the Medicare prescription drug bill, I opposed the Wall Street bailout. What the American people are starting to see is that Republican, Republicans on Capitol Hill get it and the Democrats, from the White House to Capitol Hill, just don't get it.

Mike Pence

#33. The reality is the cap-and-trade legislation offered by the Democrats amounts to an economic declaration of war on the Midwest by liberals on Capitol Hill.

Mike Pence

#34. Like every American, I will never forget where I was on the morning of September 11, 2001. As a member of Congress from Indiana, that day my duties took me to Capitol Hill and to sights and sounds I will never forget.

Mike Pence

#35. After all, Wall Street is clearly the most powerful lobbying force on Capitol Hill. From 1998 through 2008, the financial sector spent over $5 billion in lobbying and campaign contributions to deregulate Wall Street.

Bernie Sanders

#36. Climbing has worked for me in a number of ways on Capitol Hill. I'm much more inclined to look at what people do, as opposed to what they say. Also, it's about working together - we're all on the rope together, and you don't get to cut the rope if you're not getting along with someone.

Mark Udall