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I was like everyone else when Obama was elected – optimistic.

Gore Vidal

The Turner Diaries’ is a racist daydream by a former physics teacher writing under the pseudonym Andrew Macdonald.
GORE VIDAL

Race Teacher Writing
It is true, as Sartre once wrote, referring to French Army atrocities in Algeria, that the real tragedy in our time is that any of us can be, interchangeably, victim or torturer.
GORE VIDAL

Change Reality Time Torture Victim
All in all, I would not have missed this century for the world.
GORE VIDAL

Missing Myself World
As for my support for Obama, remember that I was brought up in Washington. It was an all-black city when I was a kid. And I’ve always been very pro-African-American – or whatever phrase we now use.
GORE VIDAL

Children Country Myself Support
Obama just came swiftly out of nowhere, which was a relief to those of us who care about the Republic, and at first he seemed a very good thing.
GORE VIDAL

Goodness Government Himself Politics President Public relief
There is no human problem which could not be solved if people would simply do as I advise.
GORE VIDAL

Human Myself People Problem Solution
It is very difficult for a writer of my generation, if he is honest, to pretend indifference to the work of Somerset Maugham. He was always so entirely there.
GORE VIDAL

Difficult Himself Honesty Pretend
Americans, in general, are ignorant, bigoted, and deeply unhappy with their declining incomes.
GORE VIDAL

Decline Ignorance Income Sadness
Between fourteen and nineteen, I must have begun and abandoned six novels.
GORE VIDAL

Age Beginning Myself
The theater needs continual reminders that there is nothing more debasing than the work of those who do well what is not worth doing at all.
GORE VIDAL

Need Reminder Theatre Well Worth
American history has fallen more and more into the hands of academics.
GORE VIDAL

Academics Fall Hands History
It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail.
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Enough Failure Success
I was the most famous kid in the United States. That was 1936.
GORE VIDAL

Children Country Famous Past Time
If you are a Representative and want to be a Senator, you must be careful not to do anything which might upset the various forces you need to harness to get elected.
GORE VIDAL

Election Force Yourself
Actually, I can’t remember when I was not writing.
GORE VIDAL

Myself Remember Writing
Think of the earth as a living organism that is being attacked by billions of bacteria whose numbers double every forty years. Either the host dies, or the virus dies, or both die.
GORE VIDAL

Attack Death Earth Ourselves Thinking
Since we have literally targeted our enemies, the Pentagon assumes that, sooner or later, rogues will take out our cities, presumably from spaceships.
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Assumption Enemy Ourselves Space Target
When I say ‘president,’ I still mean Roosevelt – wisely, I think.
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Myself President Thinking
Until very recently, the artist was a magician who did his magic in public view but kept himself and his effects a matter of mystery.
GORE VIDAL

Artist Himself Magic Mystery Public View
A friend was surprised to hear me say that there was not one moment of my past that I would like to relive.
GORE VIDAL

Friendship Moments Myself Past Surprise
Remember, I’m West Point, where I was born. My father went there.
GORE VIDAL

Born Father Myself Remember
In the writing of novels, there is the problem of how to shape a narrative.
GORE VIDAL

Novel Problem Shape Writing
After adolescence, if one’s life is sufficiently interesting, the desire to tell oneself stories diminishes.
GORE VIDAL

Diminish Interesting Life Oneself Story
Jews, blacks and homosexuals are despised by the Christian and Communist majorities of East and West. Also, as a result of the invention of Israel, Jews can now count on the hatred of the Islamic world.
GORE VIDAL

Black Communist Hate Result World
By the time a man gets to be presidential material, he’s been bought ten times over.
GORE VIDAL

Himself Man Material President Time
Having no contemporaries left means you cannot say, ‘Well, so-and-so will like this,’ which you do when you’re younger. You realize there is no so-and-so anymore. You are your own so-and-so. There is a bleak side to it.
GORE VIDAL

Contemporary Realize Young Yourself
Envy is the central fact of American life.
GORE VIDAL

Central Fact Life

I was like everyone else when Obama was elected – optimistic.

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I was like everyone else when Obama was elected – optimistic.

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