Barack Obama Quotes

Obama

Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.

Barack Obama
(Speech, 2008)

A good compromise, a good piece of legislation, is like a good sentence; or a good piece of music. Everybody can recognize it. They say, "Huh. It works. It makes sense."

Barack Obama (The Candidate in The New Yorker, 2004)

If the people cannot trust their government to do the job for which it exists - to protect them and to promote their common welfare - all else is lost.

Barack Obama (An Honest Government, A Hopeful Future, 2006)

This is the moment when we must build on the wealth that open markets have created, and share its benefits more equitably. Trade has been a cornerstone of our growth and global development. But we will not be able to sustain this growth if it favors the few, and not the many.

Barack Obama (Speech in Berlin, 2008)

I understand why war is not popular, but I also know this: The belief that peace is desirable is rarely enough to achieve it. Peace requires responsibility. Peace entails sacrifice.

Barack Obama (Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech, 2009)
- More [War Quotes] [Peace Quotes]

Because if we are willing to work for it, and fight for it, and believe in it, then I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on earth.

Barack Obama (Speech in St. Paul, Minnesota, 2008)



My parents shared not only an improbable love, they shared an abiding faith in the possibilities of this nation. They would give me an African name, Barack, or blessed, believing that in a tolerant America your name is no barrier to success.

Barack Obama (Democratic National Convention Speech, 2004)

If there's a child on the south side of Chicago who can't read, that matters to me, even if it's not my child. If there's a senior citizen somewhere who can't pay for their prescription, who has to choose between medicine and the rent, that makes my life poorer - even if it's not my grandparent. If there's an Arab-American or Mexican-American family being rounded up by John Ashcroft without benefit of an attorney or due process, I know that that threatens my civil liberties. And I don't have to be a woman to be concerned that the Supreme Court is trying to take away a woman's right, because I know that my rights are next. It is that fundamental belief - I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper - that makes this country work.

Barack Obama

This is the moment when we must come together to save this planet. Let us resolve that we will not leave our children a world where the oceans rise and famine spreads and terrible storms devastate our lands.

Barack Obama (Speech in Berlin, 2008)
- More [Children Quotes]

I believe that all nations - strong and weak alike - must adhere to standards that govern the use of force.

Barack Obama (Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech, 2009)

That is the true genius of America, a faith in the simple dreams of its people, the insistence on small miracles. That we can say what we think, write what we think, without hearing a sudden knock on the door. That we can have an idea and start our own business without paying a bribe or hiring somebody's son. That we can participate in the political process without fear of retribution, and that our votes will be counted - or at least, most of the time.

Barack Obama (Democratic National Convention Speech, 2004)

The journey will be difficult. The road will be long. I face this challenge with profound humility, and knowledge of my own limitations. But I also face it with limitless faith in the capacity of the American people.

Barack Obama (Speech in St. Paul, Minnesota, 2008)

I'm inspired by the people I meet in my travels - hearing their stories, seeing the hardships they overcome, their fundamental optimism and decency. I'm inspired by the love people have for their children. And I'm inspired by my own children, how full they make my heart. They make me want to work to make the world a little bit better. And they make me want to be a better man.

Barack Obama

There is not a liberal America and a conservative America - there is the United States of America. There is not a black America and a white America and latino America and asian America - there's the United States of America.

Barack Obama (Democratic National Convention Speech, 2004)

The strongest democracies flourish from frequent and lively debate, but they endure when people of every background and belief find a way to set aside smaller differences in service of a greater purpose.

Barack Obama (Press conference, 2009)

It took a lot of blood, sweat and tears to get to where we are today, but we have just begun. Today we begin in earnest the work of making sure that the world we leave our children is just a little bit better than the one we inhabit today.

Barack Obama
- More [Effort Quotes] [Perseverance Quotes]

One voice can change a room, and if one voice can change a room, then it can change a city, and if it can change a city, it can change a state, and if it change a state, it can change a nation, and if it can change a nation, it can change the world. Your voice can change the world.

Barack Obama

I think when you spread the wealth around it's good for everybody.

Barack Obama

I don't care whether you're driving a hybrid or an SUV. If you're headed for a cliff, you have to change direction. That's what the American people called for in November, and that's what we intend to deliver.

Barack Obama (Remarks at a Conference in Williamsburg, Virginia, 2009)

We have real enemies in the world. These enemies must be found. They must be pursued and they must be defeated.

Barack Obama (Democratic National Convention Speech, 2004)

The best way to not feel hopeless is to get up and do something. Don’t wait for good things to happen to you. If you go out and make some good things happen, you will fill the world with hope, you will fill yourself with hope.

Barack Obama

Clear-eyed, we can understand that there will be war, and still strive for peace. We can do that — for that is the story of human progress; that's the hope of all the world; and at this moment of challenge, that must be our work here on Earth.

Barack Obama (Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech, 2009)
- More [War Quotes] [Peace Quotes]

It's important for us to pause for a moment and make sure that we are talking with each other in a way that heals, not a way that wounds.

Barack Obama (Tucson Memorial Adress, 2011)

We do not have to think that human nature is perfect for us to still believe that the human condition can be perfected. We do not have to live in an idealized world to still reach for those ideals that will make it a better place.

Barack Obama (Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech, 2009)
- More [Happiness Quotes]

Contrary to the rumours that you've heard, I was not born in a manger. I was actually born on Krypton and sent here by my father, Jor-El, to save the planet Earth.

Barack Obama (Joke at the Al Smith Dinner in New York, 2008)
- More [Funny Quotes]

Focusing your life solely on making a buck shows a certain poverty of ambition. It asks too little of yourself. Because it's only when you hitch your wagon to something larger than yourself that you realize your true potential.

Barack Obama (Knox College Commencement Adress, 2005)
- More [Success Quotes]

If you're walking down the right path and you're willing to keep walking, eventually you'll make progress.

Barack Obama
- More [Success Quotes]

Yes we can!

Barack Obama (Campaign slogan, 2008)

What I’ve realized is that life doesn’t count for much unless you’re willing to do your small part to leave our children - all of our children - a better world. Any fool can have a child. That doesn’t make you a father. It’s the courage to raise a child that makes you a father.

Barack Obama
- More [Children Quotes] [Father Quotes]

We lose ourselves when we compromise the very ideals that we fight to defend. And we honor those ideals by upholding them not when it's easy, but when it is hard.

Barack Obama (Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech, 2009)
- More [Perseverance Quotes]

I don't oppose all wars. What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war.

Barack Obama (Remarks to Illnois State, 2002)
- More [War Quotes]

Money is not the only answer, but it makes a difference.

Barack Obama

As a nuclear power - as the only nuclear power to have used a nuclear weapon - the United States has a moral responsibility to act.

Barack Obama (Remarks in Prague, 2009)

Let us reach for the world that ought to be - that spark of the divine that still stirs within each of our souls.

Barack Obama (Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech, 2009)

Barack Obama Biography

Born: August 4, 1961

Barack Obama is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African-American to hold office and he was also awarded the nobel peace prize in 2009.

Notable Works

The Audacity of Hope (2006)

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