There are few ironclad rules of diplomacy but to one there is no exception. When an official reports that talks were useful, it can safely be concluded that nothing was accomplished.

Quote by John Kenneth Galbraith

Topics: John Kenneth Galbraith Quotes

Meetings are indispensable when you don't want to do anything.

Meetings are indispensable when you don't want to do anything.

All successful revolutions are the kicking in of a rotten door.

All successful revolutions are the kicking in of a rotten door.

Nothing is so admirable in politics as a short memory.

Nothing is so admirable in politics as a short memory.

If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.

If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.

When people put their ballots in the boxes, they are, by that act, inoculated against...

When people put their ballots in the boxes, they are, by that act, inoculated against...

We have escapist fiction, so why not escapist biography?

We have escapist fiction, so why not escapist biography?

One of the little-celebrated powers of Presidents (and other high government officials) is to listen...

One of the little-celebrated powers of Presidents (and other high government officials) is to listen...

Meetings are indispensable when you don't want to do anything.

Meetings are indispensable when you don't want to do anything.

The great dialectic in our time is not, as anciently and by some still supposed,...

The great dialectic in our time is not, as anciently and by some still supposed,...

We are becoming the servants in thought, as in action, of the machine we have...

We are becoming the servants in thought, as in action, of the machine we have...

Politics is the art of choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable.

Politics is the art of choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable.

Of all classes the rich are the most noticed and the least studied.

Of all classes the rich are the most noticed and the least studied.

The conventional view serves to protect us from the painful job of thinking.

The conventional view serves to protect us from the painful job of thinking.

The Metropolis should have been aborted long before it became New York, London or Tokyo.

The Metropolis should have been aborted long before it became New York, London or Tokyo.

Total physical and mental inertia are highly agreeable, much more so than we allow ourselves...

Total physical and mental inertia are highly agreeable, much more so than we allow ourselves...

There is certainly no absolute standard of beauty. That precisely is what makes its pursuit...

There is certainly no absolute standard of beauty. That precisely is what makes its pursuit...

In any great organization it is far, far safer to be wrong with the majority...

In any great organization it is far, far safer to be wrong with the majority...

Few people at the beginning of the nineteenth century needed an adman to tell them...

Few people at the beginning of the nineteenth century needed an adman to tell them...

Faced with the choice between changing one's mind and proving that there is no need...

Faced with the choice between changing one's mind and proving that there is no need...

In the United States, though power corrupts, the expectation of power paralyzes.

In the United States, though power corrupts, the expectation of power paralyzes.