black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

I had always been interested in politics. I had assumed – for two reasons, being Jewish and being gay back in the late ’50s, early ’60s – that I would never be elected or anything, but I would participate as an activist.

Barney Frank

Today, many people take for granted the notion that people whose lives are going to be very heavily affected by public policies should have a say in how they are formulated and carried out.
BARNEY FRANK

Affected Grant People Policy Public
These two entities Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are not facing any kind of financial crisis. The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing.
BARNEY FRANK

Affordable Housing People Two
The issue is not that morals be applied to public policy, it’s that conservatives bring public policy to spheres of our lives where it should not enter.
BARNEY FRANK

Issues Moral Spheres
I can tell you about health care and also about the financial reform bill. The Barack Obama, the President personally and his administration officials at his direction were very much involved.
BARNEY FRANK

Care Financial President
There is a correlation between people who attack same-sex marriage and have difficulty maintaining their own.
BARNEY FRANK

Maintaining People Sex
I have this fear that one day there’s going to be a fire in the Senate and there are only going to be 57 senators there and they’ll all die because they won’t have 60 votes to allow themselves to leave the building.
BARNEY FRANK

Fire One Day Vote
Conservatives believe that from the standpoint of the federal government, life begins at conception and ends at birth.
BARNEY FRANK

Believe Birth Government
Well, many of us believe that excessive media concentration is a subject that ought to be addressed, and it is, of course, the intention of the majority party not to allow that to be discussed.
BARNEY FRANK

Believe Media Party
Martin Luther King said, and it is sadly still true, that one of the most segregated times in America is the hour of worship.
BARNEY FRANK

Country Kings Worship
Ronald Reagan got a lot of democrats. I wish he hadn`t. I got to Congress with Reagan coming to the Whitehouse. The Reagan Program, a very radical one, a very drastic one passed because he had a lot of democrats. He worked at it personally and also because Reagan retained a popularity.
BARNEY FRANK

Popularity Program Wish
I smoke a cigar or two a day. I did have a brownie once. It made me sleepy.
BARNEY FRANK

Cigar Sleepy Two
Nothing in the world is as mobile as capital. It can move anywhere in the world instantaneously.
BARNEY FRANK

Mobile Moving World
Regarding homophobia in general, the good news is that there is a lot less of it than there used to be. The bad news is that it ever existed in the first place, and the worse news is that it remains far stronger than is healthy for a society dedicated in theory to equality under the law.
BARNEY FRANK

Diversity Equality Under Justice Law
There is an irony that the most active anti-gay groups are Al-Qaeda and the American Right wing.
BARNEY FRANK

Gay Groups Wings
If people knew of ethics violations, they should have sent them to the Ethics Committee. If you think there was serious ethics violation that ought to be looked at, you don’t hold it back for retaliatory purposes.
BARNEY FRANK

People Serious Thinking Violation
Increasing inequality in income distribution in this country has broader policy implications, and there is also the growing problem of perverse incentives that result from executives receiving grossly disproportionate compensation based on decisions they themselves take.
BARNEY FRANK

Country Decision Receiving
There were a lot of Romneys. There’s the Romney who was going to be better on gay rights than Ted Kennedy; now there’s a Romney who checks with Rick Santorum on that issue.
BARNEY FRANK

Better Country Gay Rights
It is, of course, further indication that a fundamentalist right has really taken over much of the Republican Party, People might cite George Bush as proof that you can be totally impervious to the effects of Harvard and Yale education.
BARNEY FRANK

Party Taken Yale
I do not believe that the federal government should treat adults who choose to smoke marijuana as criminals.
BARNEY FRANK

Believe Government Marijuana
It is because the fight against the harshest aspects of unrestricted capitalism is therefore a political problem and not an intellectual one that community action remains so essential.
BARNEY FRANK

Aquarium Community Fighting
I do not think that any self-respecting radical in history would have considered advocating people’s rights to get married, join the Army, and earn a living as a terribly inspiring revolutionary platform.
BARNEY FRANK

Army Rights Thinking
It seems to me that politicians ought to use the same words as other people.
BARNEY FRANK

People Politician Use
Most people who are activists and are concerned about issues get their information from sources which reinforce their opinions and give them the facts that they want to hear.
BARNEY FRANK

Giving Issues People
I wouldn’t want [gay marriage] to go to the United States Supreme Court now because that homophobe Antonin Scalia has too many votes on this current court.
BARNEY FRANK

Country Gay People United States
I hope we will not so characterize religious people as being so narrow and so biased towards people not of their own religion that they cannot even work with them in this common cause to which you say they are committed.
BARNEY FRANK

People Prejudice Religious
These two entities—Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac—are not facing any kind of financial crisis.
BARNEY FRANK

Financial Kind Two
Donald Trump has done more for getting people to understand the importance of public policy that respond to public needs in an affirmative way than anything we could have done on our own.
BARNEY FRANK

Done Importance People

I had always been interested in politics. I had assumed – for two reasons, being Jewish and being gay back in the late ’50s, early ’60s – that I would never be elected or anything, but I would participate as an activist.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

I had always been interested in politics. I had assumed – for two reasons, being Jewish and being gay back in the late ’50s, early ’60s – that I would never be elected or anything, but I would participate as an activist.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Barney Frank Quotes