Actual Quotes from J. Danforth "Dan" Quayle
Former Vice-President of the United States

• "I was recently on a tour of Latin America, and the only regret I have was that I didn't study Latin harder in school so I could converse with those people."
  
  
• "If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure."
  
  
• "Republicans understand the importance of bondage between a mother and child."
  
  
• "Welcome to President Bush, Mrs. Bush, and my fellow astronauts."
  
  
• "Mars is essentially in the same orbit... Mars is somewhat the same distance from the Sun, which is very important. We have seen pictures where there are canals, we believe, and water. If there is water, that means there is oxygen. If oxygen, that means we can breathe." 8/11/89
  
  
• "What a waste it is to lose one's mind. Or not to have a mind is being very wasteful. How true that is."
  
  
• "The Holocaust was an obscene period in our nation's history. I mean in this century's history. But we all lived in this century. I didn't live in this century." 9/15/88
  
  
• "I believe we are on an irreversible trend toward more freedom and democracy - but that could change." 5/22/89
  
  
• "One word sums up probably the responsibility of any vice president, and that one word is 'to be prepared'." 12/6/89
  
  
• "May our nation continue to be the beakon of hope to the world." The Quayles' 1989 Christmas card.
  
  
• "Verbosity leads to unclear, inarticulate things." 11/30/88
  
  
• "We don't want to go back to tomorrow, we want to go forward."
  
  
• "I have made good judgements in the Past. I have made good judgements in the Future."
  
  
• "The future will be better tomorrow."
  
  
• "We're going to have the best-educated American people in the world." 9/21/88
  
  
• "People that are really very weird can get into sensitive positions and have a tremendous impact on history."
  
  
• "I stand by all the misstatements that I've made." to Sam Donaldson, 8/17/89
  
  
• "We have a firm commitment to NATO, we are a *part* of NATO. We have a firm commitment to Europe. We are a *part* of Europe."
  
  
• "Public speaking is very easy." to reporters in 10/88
  
  
• "I am not part of the problem. I am a Republican."
  
  
• "I love California, I practically grew up in Phoenix."
  
  
• "A low voter turnout is an indication of fewer people going to the polls."
  
  
• "When I have been asked during these last weeks who caused the riots and the killing in L.A., my answer has been direct and simple: Who is to blame for the riots? The rioters are to blame. Who is to blame for the killings? The killers are to blame."
  
  
• "Illegitimacy is something we should talk about in terms of not having it." 5/20/92
  
  
• "We are ready for any unforeseen event that may or may not occur." 9/22/90
  
  
• "For NASA, space is still a high priority." 9/5/90
  
  
• "Quite frankly, teachers are the only profession that teach our children." 9/18/90
  
  
• "The American people would not want to know of any misquotes that Dan Quayle may or may not make."
  
  
• "We're all capable of mistakes, but I do not care to enlighten you on the mistakes we may or may not have made."
  
  
• "It isn't pollution that's harming the environment. It's the impurities in our air and water that are doing it."
  
  
• "[It's] time for the human race to enter the solar system."
  
  
• "Bobby Knight told me this: 'There is nothing that a good defense cannot beat a better offense.'In other words a good offense wins." comparing the offensive capabilities of the Warsaw Pact with the defensive system of NATO
  
  
• "Why wouldn't an enhanced deterrent, a more stable peace, a better prospect to denying the ones who enter conflict in the first place to have a reduction of offensive systems and an introduction to defensive capability. I believe that is the route this country will eventually go."
  
  
• "Hawaii has always been a very pivotal role in the Pacific. It is IN the Pacific. It is a part of the United States that is an island that is right here."September 1989
  
  
• "You all look like happy campers to me. Happy campers you are, happy campers you have been, and, as far as I am concerned, happy campers you will always be." to Samoans, whose capital Quayle pronounces "Pogo Pogo"
  
  
• "We expect them [Salvadoran officials] to work toward the elimination of human rights."
  
  
• "El Salvador is a democracy so it's not surprising that there are many voices to be heard here. Yet in my conversations with Salvadorans... I have heard a single voice."
  
  
• "It's rural America. It's where I came from. We always refer to ourselves as real America. Rural America, real America, real, real, America."
  
  
• "Target prices? How that works? I know quite a bit about farm policy. I come from Indiana, which is a farm state. Deficiency payments - which are the key - that is what gets money into the farmer's hands. We got loan, uh, rates, we got target, uh, prices, uh, I have worked very closely with my senior colleague, (Indiana Sen.) Richard Lugar, making sure that the farmers of Indiana are taken care of."
  
  
• "I not going to focus on what I have done in the past what I stand for, what I articulate to the American people. The American people will judge me on what I am saying and what I have done in the last 12 years in the Congress."
  
  
• "I want to be Robin to Bush's Batman."
  
  
• "We should develop anti-satellite weapons because we could not have prevailed without them in 'Red Storm Rising'."
  
  
• "The US has a vital interest in that area of the country." (referring to Latin America)
  
  
• "Japan is an important ally of ours. Japan and the United States of the Western industrialized capacity, 60 percent of the GNP, two countries. That's a statement in and of itself."
  
  
• "Who would have predicted... that Dubcek, who brought the tanks into Czechoslovakia in 1968 is now being proclaimed a hero in Czechoslovakia. Unbelievable." (Actually, Dubcek was the leader of the Prague Spring. The tanks were brought in to oppose his movement.)
  
  
• "Well, it looks as if the top part fell on the bottom part." (referring to the collapsed section of the 880 freeway after the San Francisco earthquake of 1989.)
  
  
• "getting [cruise missiles] more accurate so that we can have precise precision."
  
  
• "I can identify with steelworkers. I can identify with workers that have had a difficult time."
  
  
• "[I will never have] another Jimmy Carter grain embargo, Jimmy, Jimmy Carter, Jimmy Carter grain embargo, Jimmy Carter grain embargo." (during the Benson debate)
  
  
• "Certainly, I know what to do, and when I am Vice President -- and I will be -- there will be contingency plans under different sets of situations and I tell you what, I'm not going to go out and hold a news conference about it. I'm going to put it in a safe and keep it there! Does that answer your question?"
  
  
• "Lookit, I've done it their way this far and now it's my turn. I'm my own handler. Any questions? Ask me ... There's not going to be any more handler stories because I'm the handler ... I'm Doctor Spin."
  
  
• "We will invest in our people, quality education, job opportunity, family, neighborhood, and yes, a thing we call America."
  
  
• "Don't forget about the importance of the family. It begins with the family. We're not going to redefine the family. Everybody knows the definition of the family. [Meaningful pause] A child. [Meaningful pause] A mother. [Meaningful pause] A father. There are other arrangements of the family, but that is a family and family values. I've been very blessed with wonderful parents and a wonderful family, and I am proud of my family. Anybody turns to their family. I have a very good family. I'm very fortunate to have a very good family. I believe very strongly in the family. It's one of the things we have in our platform, is to talk about it. I suppose three important things certainly come to my mind that we want to say thank you. The first would be our family. Your family, my family -- which is composed of an immediate family of a wife and three children, a larger family with grandparents and aunts and uncles. We all have our family, whichever that may be ... The very beginnings of civilization, the very beginnings of this country, goes back to the family. And time and time again, I'm often reminded, especially in this Presidential campaign, of the importance of a family, and what a family means to this country. And so when you pay thanks I suppose the first thing that would come to mind would be to thank the Lord for the family."

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