Top 90 Howard Dean Quotes (2025 Update)
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51. “We’ve not had one Republican president in 34 years balance the budget. You can’t trust right-wing Republicans with your money. You ought to hire somebody who has balanced a budget. I’m much more conservative with money than George Bush is.”

— Howard Dean

52. “Most Christmas carols have no obvious religious content, or at least that’s noticeable to most people. I mean, it is almost by definition, a cultural phenomenon, all these songs, even though they point to this very religious holiday. They’re not religious songs in effect anymore.”

— Howard Dean

53. “How much courage does it take for Dean to throw red meat to the party faithful?”

— Howard Dean

54. “Second of all, I don’t think Wall Street is doing what it’s supposed to be doing, even after the shameful performance of the last two years. They’re are not allocating capital.”

— Howard Dean

55. “That’s one of the things about the Tea Party people. They think corporations have too much influence in American life and they do.”

— Howard Dean

56. “Tom DeLay ought to go back to Houston where he can serve his jail sentence.”

— Howard Dean

57. “I like John Kerry. I think he’s intellectually curious and very thoughtful. I think he’s deeply committed on issues like the environment. I think he’s an internationalist, which I am.”

— Howard Dean

58. “There’s no question that Saddam Hussein is a threat to the United States and to our allies. If Saddam persists in thumbing his nose at the inspectors, then we’re clearly going to have to do something about it.”

— Howard Dean

59. “This country was the moral leader of the world until George Bush became president.”

— Howard Dean

60. “Someone earlier made a remark about losing 500 soldiers and 2,200 wounded in Iraq. Those soldiers were sent there by the vote of Sen. Lieberman, Sen. Edwards and Sen. Kerry. I think that is a serious matter.”

— Howard Dean

61. “The war in Iraq was unwinnable.”

— Howard Dean

62. “My view is FOX News is a propaganda outlet for the Republican Party and I don’t comment on FOX News.”

— Howard Dean

63. “So what we – all we really want, I think, from the so-called Democratic wing of the Democratic Party is really to stand up for what we believe in.”

— Howard Dean

64. “We’re going to use Terri Schiavo later on. This is going to be an issue in 2006 and it’s going to be an issue in 2008, because we’re going to have an ad with a picture of Tom DeLay saying, ‘Do you want this guy to decide whether you die or not, or is that going to be up to your loved ones?’”

— Howard Dean

65. “I will use whatever position I have in order to root out hypocrisy. Democrats have strong moral values. Frankly, my moral values are offended by some of the things I hear on programs like “Rush Limbaugh,” and we don’t have to put up with that.”

— Howard Dean

66. “You can’t make Howard Dean a straw man. He is what he appears to be. And that’s the beauty of Howard Dean.”

— Howard Dean

67. “I have never favored a Social Security retirement age of 70 nor do I favor one of 68.”

— Howard Dean

68. “I’ve always been endorsed by the National Rifle Association.”

— Howard Dean

69. “Luckily, I’m a governor – so I get to tell you what I’ve already done not just what I’m going to do.”

— Howard Dean

70. “The State of the Union may look rosy from the White House balcony or the suites of George Bush’s wealthiest donors. But hardworking Americans will see through this president’s efforts to wrap his radical agenda with a compassionate ribbon.”

— Howard Dean

71. “I think the recovery hasn’t been stronger because the hole that was dug for President Obama by the Bush administration was far worse than anybody could imagine, first of all.”

— Howard Dean

72. “George Bush calls his biggest fundraisers Rangers and Pioneers. We gather here today and we call ourselves simply Americans.”

— Howard Dean

73. “The fact is that we wouldn’t be in Iraq if it weren’t for Democrats like Senator Kerry.”

— Howard Dean

74. “You know, to listen to Senator Lieberman, Senator Kerry, Representative Gephardt, I’m anti-Israel, I’m anti-trade, I’m anti-Medicare and I’m anti-Social Security. I wonder how I ended up in the Democratic Party. I’m not a new entrant to the Democratic Party. I’ve been here a long time.”

— Howard Dean

75. “I think in general the ends do not justify the means.”

— Howard Dean

76. “As Commander in Chief of the United States Military, I will never send our sons and daughters and our brothers and sisters to die in a foreign land without telling the truth about why they’re going there.”

— Howard Dean

77. “The Democratic Party, all the candidates from Washington, they all know each other, they all move in the same circles, and what I’m doing is breaking into the country club.”

— Howard Dean

78. “The fact that the president was willing to reveal classified information for political gain and put the interests of his political party ahead of America’s security shows that he can no longer be trusted to keep America safe.”

— Howard Dean

79. “We are the great grassroots campaign of the modern era, built from mousepads, shoe leather and hope.”

— Howard Dean

80. “The corporatization of the press really has hurt the press.”

— Howard Dean

81. “Early withdrawal from Iraq would result in unarguably, defeat and humiliation for the United States. There’s no question. We would be defeated by definition. We would be humiliated in that defeat.”

— Howard Dean

82. “Dealing with race is about educating white folks.”

— Howard Dean

83. “What I want to do more than anything as president of the United States is to restore the honor and dignity and respect that this country is owed around the world.”

— Howard Dean

84. “It is true that there’s an economic argument and an economic feeling that something different needs to happen and politicians talking out of both sides of their mouth and all that kind of stuff.”

— Howard Dean

85. “I was hoping to get a reception like this, I’d just hoped that it would be on Thursday night instead of Tuesday night.”

— Howard Dean

86. “There are no ideas in the Republican Party right now in the Congress. They’re the party of no. They desperately need some intellectual leadership. And whatever you think of Newt Gingrich, he can supply intellectual leadership. So I hope he does run.”

— Howard Dean

87. “When you – when you – and this is still going on today – are making your money by pushing paper around, when you should be making your money by investing venture capital in various job-creating things, that makes it much harder to recover.”

— Howard Dean

88. “John Ashcroft is not a patriot, John Ashcroft is a descendant of Joseph McCarthy.”

— Howard Dean

89. “America’s greatness rests on far more than the power of our arms. Our greatness is also measured by our goodness, it’s in the capacity of our minds, of our hearts, and it’s in the strength of our democracy.”

— Howard Dean

90. “As governor, I came to believe that the death penalty would be a just punishment for certain, especially heinous crimes, such as the murder of a child or the murder of a police officer. The events of September 11 convinced me that terrorists also deserve the ultimate punishment.”

— Howard Dean

91. “I wish that there was a unified Democratic position on the war in Iraq. I was that there was a unified American position and everybody agreed with me that we ought to be out of there yesterday. But they don’t, and that’s the fact. I mean, he’s stating a fact about what’s going on.”

— Howard Dean