Dianne Feinstein Quotes

Designing new low-yield nuclear weapons for limited strikes dangerously lowers the threshold for their use.

The sole purpose of nuclear weapons must be to deter their use by others.

Winning may not be everything, but losing has little to recommend it.

Simply put, Guantanamo is one of the best propaganda tools that terrorists have today. Our enemies use it to justify terrorism and recruit others to carry out violent jihad, and our allies continue to criticize it as a violation of the rule of law.

It is my hope that the number of stem cell lines available for federally-funded research will be expanded so that the government can continue to participate in this vital research and provide hope to the millions of Americans with diseases that might be cured.

The criteria for serving one’s country should be competence, courage and willingness to serve. When we deny people the chance to serve because of their sexual orientation, we deprive them of their rights of citizenship, and we deprive our armed forces the service of willing and capable Americans.

America is still the land of opportunity, and hard work is still a pathway to success.

If I could have banned them all…I would have!

Our system of checks and balances requires policymakers to have accurate information about government actions.

The National Guard fulfills the militia mentioned in the Second amendment. Citizens no longer need to protect the states or themselves.

There’s no reason to think a Guantanamo detainee is any more likely to escape from Supermax than any other federal prisoner.

I basically believe the medical insurance industry should be nonprofit, not profit-making. There is no way a health reform plan will work when it is implemented by an industry that seeks to return money to shareholders instead of using that money to provide health care.

Global warming is real. It is happening today. It is being charted by our satellites. It is being charted by our scientists. It is being charted by those of us in this body, and I think the real key is if we are ready to admit that fact and take the action to make the necessary conversion.

Ports are the gaping hole in America’s homeland security.

I think that some restriction on speech is appropriate.

A woman does not have to make decisions based on the need to survive. She can cut through issues, call shots as she sees them….Many bad decisions are made by men in government because it is good for them personally to make bad public decisions.

There is no more direct or honest person than Jim Clapper.

We’re not perfect, and there are some dark patches in our past, but what makes us special is that we recognize these evils, we come to grips with them, and we fix them.

We cannot expect to keep our nation’s secrets secure – or provide meaningful oversight for our intelligence agencies – if proper classification of our country’s secrets is as likely as a coin flip.

Supreme Court justices should not be an extension of the Republican Party.

Yes, I support the death penalty. It is an issue that cannot be fudged or hedged.

At age 14, my paternal grandfather fled Poland to escape the pogroms that killed tens of thousands of European Jews. He worked full-time for a cobbler in Boston, making his way to California and eventually starting his own business in Taft – the Goldman Oil Supply Company.

I am religious in my thinking.

In the wake of 9/11, we were desperate to bring those responsible for the brutal attacks to justice. But even that urgency did not justify torture. The United States must be held to a higher standard than our enemies, yet some of our actions did not clear that bar.

Rogue internet pharmacies continue to pose a serious threat to the health and safety of Americans. Simply put, a few unethical physicians and pharmacists have become drug suppliers to a nation.

If I could have gotten 51 votes in the Senate of the United States for an outright ban, picking up every one of them… ‘Mr. and Mrs. America, turn ’em all in,’ I would have done it.

Ninety percent of leadership is the ability to communicate something people want.

We have a chance to wind down and expedite the removal of 96 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons. What an achievement it would be, if at the end of the next administration, we could say that the nuclear arsenals of both Russia and the United States had been reduced to the barest minimums.

‘No Child Left Behind’ requires states and school districts to ensure that all students are learning and are reaching their highest potential. Special education students should not be left out of these accountability mechanisms.

Toughness doesn’t have to come in a pinstripe suit.

Information-sharing is elementary to good intelligence work.

As a former nine-year member of the Board of Supervisors and nine-year mayor, I know firsthand the merits of strong zoning laws. They protect residential areas so they can support families and be free of commercial activities that are not related to neighborhood needs.

Tax reform shouldn’t add one penny to our deficit or to the tax bills of middle-class Americans.

Once you sacrifice your rights, it’s hard to get those rights protected again.

America is big enough to admit when it’s wrong and confident enough to learn from its mistakes.

It’s a myth that the border can’t be enforced. It can be enforced.

In addition to being a terrorist recruiting tool, Guantanamo is a huge drain on taxpayer dollars.

I’ve passed on a number of bills. I’ve studied the Constitution myself. I am reasonably well educated…

For the life of me, I don’t understand what honest motive there is in putting this in front of this body to philosophically debate marriage on a constitutional amendment that is not going to happen, and which is enormously divisive in all of our communities.

We have federal regulations and state laws that prohibit hunting ducks with more than three rounds. And yet it’s legal to hunt humans with 15-round, 30-round, even 150-round magazines.

Torture goes against the very soul of our country. We are a democracy, established on the rule of law.

Nuclear weapons present us with a paradox: We spend billions of dollars building and maintaining them in the hope that we never have to use them.

Assault weapons pose a grave threat to all Americans, but most especially to law enforcement officers on our city streets.

It is my belief that tax credits only go to people who are making money, and they generally keep it.

The time has come to repeal ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.’ It is the right thing to do. Every American should have the opportunity to serve their country, regardless of race, sex, creed, or sexual orientation.