Republicans rarely criticize Obama for lack of empathy - in part because liberals have traditionally been seen as standing up for the weak and the vulnerable. Conservatives can be just as empathetic. But they believe that in most cases it's not government's role to be the primary dispenser of empathy.

The federal government now spends one of every four dollars in the entire economy. It borrows one of every three dollars it spends. No nation no entity large or small public or private can thrive or survive intact with debts as huge as ours.

In the Pentagon Papers case the government asserted in the Supreme Court that the publication of the material was a threat to national security. It turned out it was not a threat to U.S. security. But even if it had been that doesn't mean that it couldn't be published.

We cannot improve on the system of government handed down to us by the founders of the Republic. There is no way to improve upon that. But what we can do is to find new ways to implement that system and realize our destiny.

Our Founding Fathers crafted a constitutional Republic for the first time in the history of the world because they were shaping a form of government that would not have the failures of a democracy in it but had the representation of democracy in it.

Journalists should denounce government by public opinion polls.

To Republicans I humbly suggest that we make it possible for Democrats to give up their quest for redistribution of income and wealth by our acceptance of an appropriate role for government in financing those public goods and services necessary to secure a social safety net below which no American would be allowed to fall.

We campaigned on the fact that we were going to have to take difficult decisions because of the state of the public finances. When we got into government we discovered that actually the public finances were in an even worse state than we thought.

Unfortunately corruption is widespread in government agencies and public enterprises. Our political system promotes nepotism and wasting money. This has undermined our legal system and confidence in the functioning of the state. One of the consequences is that many citizens don't pay their taxes.

You know when Republicans were in charge we doubled the debt. But now our concern is the Democrats are in charge and they're tripling the debt. So really our concern is that we want smaller government.

In government offices which are sensitive to the vehemence and passion of mass sentiment public men have no sure tenure. They are in effect perpetual office seekers always on trial for their political lives always required to court their restless constituents.

Our great Republic is a government of laws and not of men. Here the people rule.

Our constitution works. Our great republic is a government of laws not of men.

But I don't want massive layoffs of anyone - public or private. We are planning on shrinking government through attrition and reform not through random pink slips.

People in government and public life are being kicked around at a high rate of speed.

There is nothing anyone can do anyway. The public has no power. The government knows I'm not a criminal. The parole board knows I'm not a criminal. The judge knows I'm not a criminal.

Where there is little or no public opinion there is likely to be bad government which sooner or later becomes autocratic government.

The Republican form of government is the highest form of government: but because of this it requires the highest type of human nature a type nowhere at present existing.

The public is upset. If they haven't lost their job they know somebody that has. If they haven't lost their house they know somebody that has. What do you do? When something's wrong it's government's job to fix it it must be government that's responsible for causing it.

The thought about Republicans is we're supposed to be Jeffersonian. That government governs the best that governs the least.

The conservative movement today is like that tall ship with its proud captain: strong accomplished but veering off course into the dangerous and uncharted waters of big government republicanism.

'Hello my name is the Republican Party and I got a problem. I'm addicted to spending and big government.' I'd like one of them just to stand up and say that.

And I can tell you that history will back up what I'm about to say and that is that there is no government run by conservatives Republicans put whoever you want there if you give government the opportunity to spend more money than it has it will do it. It will do it every time.

This is a government takeover of our healthcare system. It is the government basically running the entire healthcare system turning large insurers into de facto public utilities depriving people of choice depriving people of options raising people's prices raising taxes when we need new jobs.