Where have all the leaders gone?

While I'm on the subject of quotes...
Politics makes me laugh. Only because if I took it serious I would curse until I cried. I hate when people talk about "the good old days" because normally they weren't that great, we've just picked out the best part of those days to remember and have forgotten all the bad. The world of politics used to be even worse than it is now. In the debates of the old days candidates would even go after the integrity of each others wives. I don't want us to go back to that but there are things that I would love to see again. Passion and vision to name just two. Watching the speeches and debates from our presidential candidates this year makes me nauseous as they squabble over how to fix the symptoms of our societies greater problems and ignore the problems themselves. What happened to speeches like "We have nothing to fear but fear its self" and "ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country"? What happened to leaders making it their mission to put a man on the moon or end the cold war before we had it all planned out. What if President Lincoln had said "well I want to free the slaves but I'm just not sure about the logistics of it."? Anyway, here are some quotes from one of my favorite American leaders, Robert F. Kennedy. Yes he was far from perfect just like every man, but I would love to hear this kind of talk in today's politics:

The problem of power is how to achieve its responsible use rather than its irresponsible and indulgent use — of how to get men of power to live for the public rather than off the public.
"I Remember, I Believe", The Pursuit of Justice (1964)

Gross national product measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.
Speech at the University of Kansas at Lawrence (1968-03-18)
(I would encourage EVERYONE to take two minutes and listen to the larger audio clip of this on youtube.com at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e51JnJPPY0E talk about stirring the heart!)

“Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation”

A revolution is coming — a revolution which will be peaceful if we are wise enough; compassionate if we care enough; successful if we are fortunate enough — But a revolution which is coming whether we will it or not. We can affect its character; we cannot alter its inevitability.
Speech in the US Senate (9 May 1966)

Victims of the violence are black and white, rich and poor, young and old, famous and unknown. They are most important of all, human beings whom other human beings loved and needed. What has violence ever accomplished, what has it ever created? Violence breeds violence, retaliation breeds retaliation, and only a cleansing of our whole society can remove this sickness from our souls. For when you teach a man to hate and to fear his brother, when you teach that he is a lesser man because of his color, or his beliefs or the policies that he pursues, when you teach that those who are different from you threaten your freedom or your job or your home or your family, then you also learn to confront others not as fellow citizens, but as enemies. Our lives on this planet are too short, the work to be done is too great. But we can perhaps remember, that those who live with us are our brothers, that they share with us the same short moment of life, that they seek as do we, nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and in happiness, surely this bond of common fate, this bond of common roles can begin to teach us something, that we can begin to work a little harder, to become in our hearts brothers and countrymen once again.
"On the Mindless Menace of Violence", speech, City Club of Cleveland, Cleveland, Ohio

Few men are willing to brave the disapproval of their fellows, the censure of their colleagues, the wrath of their society. Moral courage is a rarer commodity than bravery in battle or great intelligence. Yet it is the one essential, vital quality for those who seek to change a world that yields most painfully to change.

(And maybe my favorite):

First is the danger of futility; the belief there is nothing one man or one woman can do against the enormous array of the world's ills -- against misery, against ignorance, or injustice and violence. Yet many of the world's great movements, of thought and action, have flowed from the work of a single man. A young monk began the Protestant reformation, a young general extended an empire from Macedonia to the borders of the earth, and a young woman reclaimed the territory of France. It was a young Italian explorer who discovered the New World, and 32-year-old Thomas Jefferson who proclaimed that all men are created equal. "Give me a place to stand," said Archimedes, "and I will move the world." These men moved the world, and so can we all.
"Day of Affirmation", speech, University of Capetown, South Africa (1966-06-06)