Bush has legitimized a huge expansion of the welfare state, liberalizing immigration, and using force for democratization abroad. All the next Democratic president has to do to finish Bush's hard work is to raise taxes to pay for it all. Andrew Sullivan More Quotes by Andrew Sullivan More Quotes From Andrew Sullivan To rid the world of Osama bin Laden, Anwar al-Awlaki and Moammar Qaddafi within six months: if Obama were a Republican, he'd be on Mount Rushmore by now. Andrew Sullivan usa political president In academia, left-liberalism is so entrenched its advocates' debating skills have gone rusty. When you've been talking to yourself for decades and imposing speech codes on everyone else, your ability to argue coherently - let alone entertainingly - inevitably wanes. Andrew Sullivan academia skills talking Blogging is to writing what extreme sports are to athletics: more free-form, more accident-prone, less formal, more alive. It is, in many ways, writing out loud. Andrew Sullivan alive writing sports I think there were two great gay Americans obviously, and that was Abraham Lincoln and Walt Whitman. Andrew Sullivan gay two thinking Is it not a rather fantastic historical irony that the torture techniques that the North Vietnamese used against McCain that forced him to offer a videotaped false confession are now the techniques the Bush administration is using to gain "intelligence" about terror networks. How is it possible to know that everything John McCain once said on videotape for the enemy was false, because it was coerced, and yet assert that everything we torture out of terror suspects using exactly the same techniques is true? Andrew Sullivan gains historical enemy The important things are not worth knowing because they are useful. They are worth knowing because they are true. Andrew Sullivan important-things important knowing Homophobia: the fear that another man will treat you like you treat women. Andrew Sullivan homosexuality like-you men Not many people sleep with other men and when the other man leaves have a nervous breakdown. Andrew Sullivan sleep men people Don't fool yourself that you're blogging when you're really just putting stuff up online. Andrew Sullivan blogging fool stuff The one thing we know about torture is that it was never designed in the first place to get at the actual truth of anything; it was designed in the darkest days of human history to produce false confessions in order to annihilate political and religious dissidents. And that is how it always works: it gets confessions regardless of their accuracy. Andrew Sullivan political religious order How can you tell when a political ideology has become the equivalent of a religion? Andrew Sullivan political ideology religion I think essentially corrupting institutions in Washington are turning conservatism into something that is really very creepy, but also emotionally and psychically powerful for people. Andrew Sullivan powerful people thinking A mind is a wonderful thing to change. Andrew Sullivan wonderful-things mind wonderful I believe in the pursuit of happiness. Not its attainment, nor its final definition, but its pursuit. I believe in the journey, not the arrival; in conversation, not monologues; in multiple questions rather than any single answer. I believe in the struggle to remake ourselves and challenge each other in the spirit of eternal forgiveness, in the awareness that none of us knows for sure what happiness truly is, but each of us knows the imperative to keep searching. I believe in the possibility of surprising joy, of serenity through pain, of homecoming through exile. Andrew Sullivan pain struggle believe Homosexuality is like the weather. It just is. Andrew Sullivan homosexuality gay weather You just have to keep going. I mean I think our job, my job, is to keep articulating that I exist and that there are lots of people like me exist and we just have no home. Andrew Sullivan home jobs mean Leftists would like to pretend that any criticism of their views raises the specter of domestic repression. But in a country with a First Amendment, no suppression from government is likely, and in the citadels of the media and the academy, the far left is actually vastly overrepresented. Andrew Sullivan government views country The day of reckoning is not just coming for Saddam Hussein. It's coming for the anti-war movement. Andrew Sullivan hussein movement war Personally, I'd rather have pins stuck in my eyes than endure a conversation with John Kerry, but I'd love to hang with Bush. Andrew Sullivan politics eye conversation I've never been a partisan, I've never been a Republican, I've never been a Democrat, ever, which is why I was very frustrated being called a gay Republican when I never attached myself to that. Andrew Sullivan frustrated republican gay
