There's the basket of deplorables, who are bigots of various stripes, misogynists, anti-Muslim, racists, homophobes. George Packer More Quotes by George Packer More Quotes From George Packer Character is destiny, and politicians usually get the scandals they deserve, with a sense of inevitability about them. George Packer scandal destiny character Twitter is crack for media addicts. George Packer addict cracks media Amazon's identity and goals are never clear and always fluid, which makes the company destabilizing and intimidating. George Packer amazon goal identity We will have a more just society as soon as we want one. George Packer want It's a cliche that the Senate is broken, and like most cliches, it's true. George Packer cliche senate broken Today, we have our own concentrations of economic power. Instead of Standard Oil, U.S. Steel, the Union Pacific Railroad, and J. P. Morgan and Company, we have Amazon, Google, Apple, Facebook, and Microsoft. George Packer google apples oil Putin stands for the opposite of a universal ideology; he has become an arch-nationalist of a pre-Cold War type, making mystic appeals to motherland and religion. George Packer arches opposites war It seems preposterous now, but Amazon began as a bookstore. George Packer amazon bookstores seems I am reading "The Yellow Birds" by Kevin Powers and "Redeployment" by Phil Klay . Both Powers and Klay are Iraq War vets. Klay's stories are remarkable. George Packer iraq reading war I'm reading a bunch of fiction by Afghan and Iraq War veterans for a New Yorker piece. There hasn't been that much, but it's starting to come out, and some of the fiction is really good. George Packer iraq reading war I think it's important for Americans to try to understand each other a little better. George Packer important trying thinking What goes on in a person's head, what impels them to a political choice, it's a pretty complicated question. George Packer political choices goes-on I don't know how we continue to do politics in a democracy if we simply can't listen to one another, if we simply close the door and say you are beyond redemption. George Packer redemption democracy doors Playing to resentment and using a lot of, you know, grand abstract phrases like make America great again is - it just doesn't have the answer. It's simply a way to whip up emotion and then leave people more bitter than you found them. George Packer phrases america people I really do put it on Bill Clinton's presidency as the time when the Democrats became the party of the college degree as the key to success in life. George Packer party keys college Hillary Clinton said we need to bring back vocational education in high school. We need to support community colleges. We need to make sure that people who are not going to finish college have a job waiting for them and the skills to do the job. These are all - have become fairly standard Democratic policy positions. George Packer college jobs school Hillary Clinton would say I'm going to fund a program that will find the local, you know, industrial or manufacturing jobs that are available and train you to do that job. And then you're going to get that job. And it's a much more of a nuts and bolts sort of policy vision. George Packer vision nuts jobs We've just been sort of spinning our wheels for such a long time, for decades really, with each new president being considered illegitimate by the other side. That's been the case ever since Bill Clinton. And it's a - you can't keep frittering away your political capital that way and expect there not to be some long-term rot that sets in. George Packer political president long People in Congress are willing to shut down the entire government or to make it impossible for a Supreme Court nominee to get a hearing or for routine appointments in the executive branch to go unfilled for years because of a hold placed by a senator. George Packer government people years This is what Newt Gingrich has wrought - is a politics in which it's very easy to destroy and very hard to build. George Packer newts hard easy