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Colin Powell Quotes


If you are going to achieve excellence in big things, you develop the habit in little matters. Excellence is not an exception, it is a prevailing attitude.

It ain't as bad as you think. It will look better in the morning.

It's a disgrace that we have millions of people who are uninsured, but at the same time too - in the eyes of the American people, in my judgment, it looked as if that somehow become more important than the main attack which was to fix the economy and get the Americans working again.

It's nice to say let's be bipartisan. But we're a partisan nation. We were raised as a partisan nation.

Leadership is solving problems. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.

Many interviewers when they come to talk to me, think they're being progressive by not mentioning in their stories any longer that I'm black. I tell them, 'Don't stop now. If I shot somebody you'd mention it.'

Never let your ego get so close to your position that when your position goes, your ego goes with it.

Never neglect details. When everyone's mind is dulled or distracted the leader must be doubly vigilant.

No battle plan survives contact with the enemy.

Organization charts and fancy titles count for next to nothing.

Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier.

Politics is not bean bags. It's serious, tough stuff.

Some of the generals are saying, 'We're making progress. We are clearing an area.' But you really don't defeat the Taliban by clearing an area. They move.

Success is the result of perfection, hard work, learning from failure, loyalty, and persistence.

Surround yourself with people who take their work seriously, but not themselves, those who work hard and play hard.

The chief condition on which, life, health and vigor depend on, is action. It is by action that an organism develops its faculties, increases its energy, and attains the fulfillment of its destiny.

The commander in the field is always right and the rear echelon is wrong, unless proved otherwise.

The healthiest competition occurs when average people win by putting above average effort.

The only bipartisanship you ever see is when they finally sign a bill and everybody says, 'Gee, isn't that wonderful?'

The purposes of the United States should not be doubted. The Security Council resolutions will be enforced - the just demands of peace and security will be met - or action will be unavoidable. And a regime that has lost its legitimacy will also lose its power.