I want to see far more decisions taken far closer to the patients the passengers and the pupils. Far more power for locally and regionally elected politicians who understand best the needs of their areas. And far more say too for the dedicated staff at all levels in health and education.

I believe that access to a university education should be based on the ability to learn not what people can afford. I think there is no more nauseating a sight than politicians pulling up the ladder of opportunity behind them.

Instead of plotting the demise of the traditional family as some politicians and religious leaders would have you believe gay people mow their lawns and watch 'American Idol' and video their children's concerts and have the same hopes and dreams that their straight counterparts do.

Indians mock their corrupt politicians relentlessly but they regard their honest politicians with silent suspicion. The first thing they do when they hear of a supposedly 'clean' politician is to grin. It is a cliche that honest politicians in India tend to have dishonest sons who collect money from people seeking an audience with Dad.

Politicians... talk in generalities and lies and I think they've caused all our grief. They're so awful they're really funny. I hate thinking this because my dad loved politics.

Remember in 1973 the same science chatter said that the coming Ice Age is going to occur we're going to lose millions of people. And the politicians knew how to solve it they just didn't have the courage to solve it they were going to put coal dust on the Arctic.

I have three favorite politicians: Reagan Truman and Bobby Kennedy - Bobby for showing remarkable political courage despite being loathed by many on both sides.

I fear some of our leaders today have lost the courage to stand up. What we have now are politicians. They won't offer real plans and only stand up when they want to blame someone else.

I don't want to clip on the armour every morning. I've seen some politicians do this and they get a bit mangled and bitter. I just refuse to do that. I refuse to be angry or bitter or complain and I remain open. I may sometimes be a bit too open but I'm not going to change that one bit.

The politicians always told us that the Cold War stand-off could only change by way of nuclear war. None of them believed that such systemic change was possible.

The future is not Big Government. Self-serving politicians. Powerful bureaucrats. This has been tried tested throughout history. The result has always been disaster. President Obama your agenda is not new. It's not change and it's not hope.

I think there's a suspicion in the South of people putting on airs. You see it in most successful Southern politicians but you also see it in someone like Richard Petty who may be a multimillionaire stock car driver but he's also beloved because he has a nice self-deprecatory way about him.

Politicians also have a love affair with the 'small business exemption.' Too much paperwork? Too heavy a burden? Not enough time? Just exempt small businesses from the rule. It sounds so pro-growth. Instead it's an admission that the costs of a regulation just can't be justified.

The 9-9-9 plan would resuscitate this economy because it replaces the outdated tax code that allows politicians to pick winners and losers and to provide favors in the form of tax breaks special exemptions and loopholes. It simplifies the code dramatically: 9% business flat tax 9% personal flat tax 9% sales tax.

I think people feel threatened by homosexuality. The problem isn't about gay people the problem is about the attitude towards gay people. People think that all gays are Hannibal Lecters. But gay people are sons and daughters politicians and doctors American heroes and daughters of American heroes.

One of the interesting things here is that the people who should be shaping the future are politicians. But the political framework itself is so dead and closed that people look to other sources like artists because art and music allow people a certain freedom.

Half a century ago the amazing courage of Rosa Parks the visionary leadership of Martin Luther King and the inspirational actions of the civil rights movement led politicians to write equality into the law and make real the promise of America for all her citizens.