Journalist Quotes

People who get on at school are the ones who play by the rules, and no one's going to get far in later life playing by the system.

Lots of us when we're children believe 'oh well, if the world knew us as we really are, they'd know what wonderful, clever, brilliant, charming people we really are.'

It's miraculous how much easier the computer has made my sort of work.

It was always inevitable that if you get serious trouble in any family then everybody's inclined to look at the head of that family and see if they see any cause or reason to associate it with the head of the, head of the family, why it should be.

I've always found women more loyal, more disciplined, less neurotic, more hardworking. I just think they're perfect colleagues. Whereas, God knows, I've dealt with plenty of neurotic men.

I'm a wet liberal really, and always have been. But I'm sort of an aggressive wet liberal.

I'm a passionate monarchist.

I would have been a disastrous soldier.

I would be miserable if I went to bed without having written 1,000 words about something.

A Tory government with a decent mandate seems the only hope of tackling the fiscal catastrophe responsibly.

Every pessimist who ever lived has been buried in an unmarked grave. Tomorrow has always been better than today, and it always will be.

I've never seen a monument erected to a pessimist.

Retiring is just practicing up to be dead. That doesn't take any practice.

I am fiercely loyal to those willing to put their money where my mouth is.

Dependency arguments often come from elites - either aid agencies or governments - and say something about attitudes to poor people.

If there is a 50-50 chance that something can go wrong, then 9 times out of ten it will.

Golf is a game in which you yell 'fore,' shoot six, and write down five.

Now you know the rest of the story.

Like what you do, if you don't like it, do something else.

When your outgo exceeds your income, the upshot may be your downfall.

Ever occur to you why some of us can be this much concerned with animals suffering? Because government is not. Why not? Animals don't vote.

In times like these, it helps to recall that there have always been times like these.

If 'pro' is the opposite of 'con' what is the opposite of 'progress'?

Kids are capable of handling a lot more than you think if you are willing to commit some time.

Deficits. Most people of knowledge say it's the biggest single problem facing the economic free world.

Ignorance per se is not nearly as dangerous as ignorance of ignorance.

When we have 'second thoughts' about something, our first thoughts don't seem like thoughts at all - just feelings.

The primary purpose of a liberal education is to make one's mind a pleasant place in which to spend one's leisure.

The greatest enemy of progress is not stagnation, but false progress.

Ninety per cent of the world's woe comes from people not knowing themselves, their abilities, their frailties, and even their real virtues. Most of us go almost all the way through life as complete strangers to ourselves - so how can we know anyone else?