State of the Union Quotes

“After acquiring Texas, Polk deliberately started a war with Mexico because, as he later told the historian George Bancroft, we had to acquire California. Thanks to Polk, we did.”
― Gore Vidal, State of the Union: The Nation's Essays 1958-2008

“After politics, journalism has always been the preferred career of the ambitious but lazy second-rater.”
― Gore Vidal, State of the Union: The Nation's Essays 1958-2008

“Since the reading skills of the American people are the lowest in the First World, the general public is always easy prey to manipulation by television.”
― Gore Vidal, State of the Union: The Nation's Essays 1958-2008

“As long as any group within the society deliberately maintains its identity it is, or should be, a fair target for satire—both for its own good and for the society’s.”
― Gore Vidal, State of the Union: The Nation's Essays 1958-2008

“the Russian governors are terrified of ideas. If only they knew what our governors know—that in a massive egalitarian society no idea which runs counter to the prevailing superstitions can successfully penetrate the official carapace.”
― Gore Vidal, State of the Union: The Nation's Essays 1958-2008

“The American passion for categorizing has now managed to create two non-existent categories—gay and straight.”
― Gore Vidal, State of the Union: The Nation's Essays 1958-2008