John McCain Quotations

The tea partiers are a great addition. The tea partiers have invigorated a base that has been dormant for a long period of time. We're going to have a broad array of different views in our Republican conference, and I think it might be more interesting than any I've been in in a long time.

I don't doubt the sincerity of my Democratic friends. And they should not doubt ours.

Only the most deluded of us could doubt the necessity of this war.

War is wretched beyond description, and only a fool or a fraud could sentimentalize its cruel reality.

I believe in evolution. But I also believe, when I hike the Grand Canyon and see it at sunset, that the hand of God is there also.

And, if we lost, then who win? Did Al Qaida win? When on the floor of the House of Representatives they cheer - they cheer - when they pass a withdrawal motion that is a certain date for surrender, what were they cheering? Surrender? Defeat?

The first pork-barrel bill that crosses my desk, I'm going to veto it and make the authors of those pork-barrel items famous all over America.

You cannot tell the enemy you're going to leave and expect the enemy to not - and expect to succeed. I mean, that's just a fundamental of warfare.

And the people who live in the southern part of my state do not have a secure environment. To wit, there are signs that the government put up that say, ‘Warning. You are in a drug smuggling area and a human smuggling area.

Do not yield. Do not flinch. Stand up. Stand up with our President and fight. We're Americans. We're Americans, and we'll never surrender. They will.

Thank God for our form of government. The media won't let there be any cover-up.

Our armed forces will fight for peace in Iraq, a peace built on more secure foundations than are found today in the Middle East. Even more important, they will fight for two human conditions of even greater value than peace: liberty and justice.

I am a Republican. I'm loyal to the party of Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt. And I believe that my party, in some ways, has strayed from those principles, particularly on the issue of fiscal discipline.

We cannot forever hide the truth about ourselves, from ourselves.

We must win in Iraq. If we withdraw, there will be chaos; there will be genocide; and they will follow us home.

On 'don't ask, don't tell' I was always the same. I said we needed a complete review of the impact on morale and battle effectiveness of 'don't ask, don't tell' before we repeal it. That's my position now. Now they're trying to ram through a repeal without a - any kind of really realistic survey done.

The problem... is that most members of Congress don't pay attention to what's going on.

The way you have bipartisan negotiations, you sit down across the table, as we did with Ted Kennedy, as I've done with many other members, and you say, 'OK, here's what I want, here's what you want. We'll adhere to your principles, but we'll make concessions.'

But please know, whether you believe campaign contributions are speech or property, that I learned to love very dearly the right of free expression when I lived without that freedom for a while a long time ago.

I am fully prepared to be commander in chief... I don't need on-the-job training.

Remember the words of Chairman Mao: 'It's always darkest before it's totally black.'.

Our political differences, now matter how sharply they are debated, are really quite narrow in comparison to the remarkably durable national consensus on our founding convictions.

My greatest fear is the Iranians acquire a nuclear weapon and give it to a terrorist organization. And there is a real threat of them doing that.

We know that Medicare's going broke in seven years, but we need to start over. That's what the American people want us to do.

Barbara Boxer is the most bitterly partisan, most anti-defense senator in the United States Senate today. I know that because I've had the unpleasant experience of having to serve with her.

As a governor and senator, John Chafee set the standard for honesty and decency that the rest of us on our best days could only dream to emulate.

I hate these governors. We should always pick senators.

I have announced my candidacy this year again for Miss Congeniality.

I am concerned -- and I think most people are concerned -- about the lack of coordination between agencies, ... The failure to work together to share information -- they're doing that now, in fact. As we know, the CIA director and the FBI director are briefing the president every morning, so there were obviously breakdowns -- particularly in coordinating and sharing information.

How would I do it any different? I don't know, but I worry that, over time, with so many warnings, with so much frequency, Americans will begin not to take them seriously,

On the subject of Osama bin Laden... we will track him down. We will capture him. We will bring him to justice, and I will follow him to the gates of hell.

I think it hurts the image of our party. What do the people of New York think about the fact they're being deprived of a choice of candidates? I think it's wrong,

Complaints on the part of passengers are at an all time high, and I'm not sure that the trend in American airlines today is healthy for or beneficial to the American passenger.

What is good for my country is good for my party, ... Should my party abandon this principle, the American people will abandon us.

I know that money corrupts. I would rather have a clean government than one where ""First Amendment rights are being respected,"" that has become corrupt. If I had my choice, I'd rather have the clean government.

I guess it was bound to happen. Governor Bush's campaign is getting desperate with a negative ad about me, ... His ad twists the truth like Clinton. We're all pretty tired of that.

Investigate those places where a new airline will come into a route and the larger airline will drop its fares way down below that of the new entrant's until the new entrant drops, and then they raise their prices up, ... That's clearly predatory behavior.

I am no longer an active candidate for my party's nomination, ... A majority of Republican voters made clear that their preference for president is Governor Bush...I respect their decision.

If I had confidence that that money would be well spent I would do it, ... I think before we spend a dime we need to make sure it's going to the people it's intended to help. But this is a compassionate land.

I don't think there's any doubt as to who will prevail,

Russia is a gas station masquerading as a country.

We are taught to understand, correctly, that courage is not the absence of fear, but the capacity for action despite our fears.

I campaigned in 2012 all over this country for months: 'Repeal and replace Obamacare.' That was not the mandate of the voters. If they wanted to repeal Obamacare, the 2012 election would have been probably significantly different.

I actually think if the American people understood what was going on instead of just being told tidbits by this administration, they would actually be a lot more supportive of the boots on the ground.

Efforts to bring about democracy have hit a wall and are going backwards.

Why is Chelsea Clinton so ugly? Because her father is Janet Reno.

Courage is the enforcing virtue, the one that makes possible all the other virtues common to exceptional leaders: honesty, integrity, confidence, compassion and humility

Hillary [Clinton] saying we're never going to put boots on the ground in Iraq, we never going to put boots on the ground in Syria petrified me, simply because, why - what if this continues despite out of control.

Americans have got to understand that we are paying present-day retirees with the taxes paid by young workers in America today. And that's a disgrace. It's an absolute disgrace and it's got to be fixed.

You know that old Beach Boys song, Bomb Iran? Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran.

I think conventional wisdom is that time is not on our side. But there are a number of members of Congress who have primaries and when those primaries are done, they may be more inclined to address the issue of comprehensive immigration reform.

What was fascinating to me , is that she [Hillary Clinton] still cannot answer eloquently, answers about her e-mails, she still can't explains to me why she's not a third term of [Barack] Obama.

Never get into a wrestling match with a pig. You both get dirty, and the pig likes it.

I will follow Osama bin Laden to the gates of hell.

What if there's another terrorist attack? I cringe at the ideas of our enemies watching this, knowing much like the president we have now. You can do anything you want, you can jerk us around, you can harass our naval ships the way Iran is doing right now, and we're not going to do anything. We're not going to react.

Men and women serving in the military deserve better than what they're giving - what we're giving them. They don't know what they're going to be doing tomorrow.

We should be I hope finally realizing what Vladimir Putin is. He's an old colonel, KGB, apparatchik, and he dreams of the restoration of the Russian empire.

I, 100 percent don't think that's where the American people at, because when there's viral pictures as a baby is in Aleppo with, you know, rubble all over them going viral, and then there are celebrities tweeting why haven't we done nothing about this? And like, oh, there are actually many people for years who've been trying to send aid then and this president won't let us.

Fear is the opportunity for courage, not proof of cowardice.

The issue of economics is not something I've understood as well as I should. I've got Greenspan's book.

Torture doesn't work.

Our economy, I think, is still -- the fundamentals of our economy are strong.

The Constitution established the United States of America as a Christian nation.

I strongly support the Second Amendment and I believe the Second Amendment ought to be preserved - which means no gun control.

I think where [Donald Trump] loses most hawkish republicans is when he talking about how much he likes [Vladimir] Putin. That should make any person who believe in the American exceptionalism, incredibly uncomfortable.

The core political values of our free society are so deeply embedded in our collective consciousness that only a few malcontents, lunatics generally, ever dare to threaten them.

I owe America more than she has ever owed me.

As long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed, it's fine with me and I hope it would be fine with you if we maintain a presence in a very volatile part of the world where al Qaeda is training, recruiting, equipping and motivating people every single day.

There's a misnomer that Hillary Clinton is as hawkish as I am, basically.

At no time have I ever done anything that would betray the public trust.

Thank God for the Saudis and Prince Bandar, and for our Qatari friends,

[Hillary Clinton] was saying, "We never going to do anything in Iraq, we're not going to do anything in Syria." Enemies, do whatever you want. Continue the largest humanitarian crisis, 7 million people displaced refugees. Do all this. We're not going to do anything. That is the type of stuff that is been happening for the past 7 1/2 years under President [Barack] Obama.

We make the future better than the past. We don't hide from history. We make history.

How much damage will have been done before we act?

We are Americans first, Americans last, and Americans always.

[Vladimir] Putin supporting Bashar al-Assad, helping with the Syrian refugee crisis and, I think for any republican, he [Donald Trump] has got to stop saying this, because I was with him. I was with him and he said that, it was like, I'm out. I'm out. It's too crazy.

Washington is a Hollywood for ugly people. Hollywood is a Washington for the simpleminded.

After all this time and all this, quote, "experience," how is she [Hillary Clinton] not better at this [military]?

Bin Laden’s death and the debate over torture

We know that Medicare's going broke in seven years, but we need to start over.That's what the American people want us to do.

We know that this nation entered into solemn treaties [with Indian tribes] which have been continuously violated for more than 250 years. It's a disgrace. It's an outrage. We must do everything in our power to keep those treaties. Otherwise, the word of the United States government is no good.

I am learning to get online myself, and I will have that down fairly soon, getting on myself. I dont expect to be a great communicator, I dont expect to set up my own blog, but I am becoming computer literate to the point where I can get the information that I need.

It's not social issues I care about.

I will veto every single beer, um, bill with earmarks.

That's give [Donald Trump] so much attention. And it's so funny. There actually have conflicting opinions on women in combat, in the military. So they have all the issues that stake. I'm more concerned with the VA than anything else.

I 'Don't See How It Matters' That I Don't Know The Price Of Gas.

There are neighborhoods in Baghdad where you and I could walk through those neighborhoods today.

So when someone, a veteran stands up and say, "Here are the facts on the VA." He [Donald Trump] says, "No, your facts are wrong." Turns out her facts are right and his facts are wrong.

I think, again, neither of these candidates [Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton] is blowing me away. Actually, I would like both of them to get more policy specific.

I am a illiterate that has to rely on my wife for all of the assistance I can get.

We should be able to deliver bottled hot water to dehydrated babies.

Bashar Assad is a major cause of the refugees which are now flooding Europe and causing such consternation in the United States.

I don't e-mail. I've never felt the particular need to e-mail.

Everybody says that they're against the special interests. I'm the only one the special interests don't give any money to.

I was concerned about a couple of steps that the Russian government took in the last several days. One was reducing the energy supplies to Czechoslovakia.

There is no confidence in the Arab world today in the United States of America.

I will not leave the Republican Party, ... The Republican Party is my home.

As almost anyone with war experience knows, you're never supposed to show the enemy what you won't do to win.

In the view of everyone, I am a viable candidate and I should be on the ballot.

I am proud to do so for I know that by supporting George W. Bush, I serve my country well.