Really Real Dan Quayle quotes

These are quotes spoken by Dan Quayle at press conferences and rallies in 1988-1990 timeframe. Plus one christmas card.

Bobby Knight told me this: 'There is nothing that a good defense cannot beat a better offense.' In other words a good offense wins.
— Vice President Dan Quayle comparing the offensive capabilities of the Warsaw Pact with the defensive system of NATO.

Republicans understand the importance of bondage between a mother and child.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

Mars is essentially in the same orbit... somewhat the same distance from the Sun, which is very important. We have seen pictures where there are canals, we believe, and water. If there is water, that means there is oxygen. If oxygen, that means we can breathe.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

Hawaii has always been a very pivotal role in the Pacific. It is IN the Pacific. It is a part of the United States that is an island that is right here.
— Vice President Dan Quayle, Hawaii, September 1989

What a terrible thing to have lost one's mind. Or not to have a mind at all. How true that is.
— Vice President Dan Quayle winning friends while speaking to the United Negro College Fund

You all look like happy campers to me. Happy campers you are, happy campers you have been, and, as far as I am concerned, happy campers you will always be.
— Vice President Dan Quayle, to the American Samoans, whose capital Quayle pronounces "Pogo Pogo"

Quayle stumbled in response to a question about his opinion of the Holocaust. He said it was "an obscene period in our nation's history." Then, trying to clarify his remark, Quayle said he meant "this century's history" and added a confusing comment. "We all lived in this century, I didn't live in this century," he said.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

We expect them [Salvadoran officials] to work toward the elimination of human rights.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

El Salvador is a democracy so it's not surprising that there are many voices to be heard here. Yet in my conversations with Salvadorans... I have heard a single voice.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

I believe we are on an irreversible trend toward more freedom and democracy - but that could change.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

One word sums up probably the responsibility of any vice president, and that one word is 'to be prepared'.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

If we do not succeed, then we run the risk of failure.
— Vice President Dan Quayle, to the Phoenix Republican Forum, March 1990

It's rural America. It's where I came from. We always refer to ourselves as real America. Rural America, real America, real, real, America.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

Target prices? How that works? I know quite a bit about farm policy. I come from Indiana, which is a farm state. Deficiency payments - which are the key - that is what gets money into the farmer's hands. We got loan, uh, rates, we got target, uh, prices, uh, I have worked very closely with my senior colleague, (Indiana Sen.) Richard Lugar, making sure that the farmers of Indiana are taken care of.
— Vice President Dan Quayle on being asked to define the term "target prices." Quayle's press secretary then cut short the press conference, after two minutes and 30 seconds.

Why wouldn't an enhanced deterrent, a more stable peace, a better prospect to denying the ones who enter conflict in the first place to have a reduction of offensive systems and an introduction to defensive capability. I believe that is the route this country will eventually go.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

I not going to focus on what I have done in the past what I stand for, what I articulate to the American people. The American people will judge me on what I am saying and what I have done in the last 12 years in the Congress.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

I want to be Robin to Bush's Batman.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

We should develop anti-satellite weapons because we could not have prevailed without them in 'Red Storm Rising'.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

The US has a vital interest in that area of the country.
— Vice President Dan Quayle Referring to Latin America.

Japan is an important ally of ours. Japan and the United States of the Western industrialized capacity, 60 percent of the GNP, two countries. That's a statement in and of itself.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

Who would have predicted... that Dubcek, who brought the tanks in in Czechoslovakia in 1968 is now being proclaimed a hero in Czechoslovakia. Unbelievable.
— Vice President Dan Quayle Actually, Dubcek was the leader of the Prague Spring.

May our nation continue to be the beakon of hope to the world.
— The Quayle's 1989 Christmas card. [Not a beacon of literacy, though.]

Well, it looks as if the top part fell on the bottom part.
— Vice President Dan Quayle referring to the collapsed section of the 880 freeway after the San Francisco earthquake of 1989. [this may be a joke; the source is unclear. but it's still funny]

getting [cruise missles] more accurate so that we can have precise precision.
— Vice President Dan Quayle referring to his legislative work dealing with cruise missles

I can identify with steelworkers. I can identify with workers that have had a difficult time.
— Vice President Dan Quayle addressing workers at an Ohio steel plant,1988

[I will never have] another Jimmy Carter grain embargo, Jimmy, Jimmy Carter, Jimmy Carter grain embargo, Jimmy Carter grain embargo.
— Vice President Dan Quayle during the Benson debate

Certainly, I know what to do, and when I am Vice President — and I will be — there will be contingency plans under different sets of situations and I tell you what, I'm not going to go out and hold a news conference about it. I'm going to put it in a safe and keep it there! Does that answer your question?
— Vice President Dan Quayle when asked what he would do if he assumed the Presidency, 1988

Lookit, I've done it their way this far and now it's my turn. I'm my own handler. Any questions? Ask me ... There's not going to be any more handler stories because I'm the handler ... I'm Doctor Spin.
— Vice President Dan Quayle responding to press reports of his aides having to, in effect, "potty train" him.

I would guess that there's adequate low-income housing in this country.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

Verbosity leads to unclear, inarticulate things.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

The real question for 1988 is whether we're going to go forward to tomorrow or past to the — to the back!
— Vice President Dan Quayle

We will invest in our people, quality education, job opportunity, family, neighborhood, and yes, a thing we call America.
— Vice President Dan Quayle, 1988

We'll let the sunshine in and shine on us, because today we're happy and tomorrow we'll be even happier.
— Vice President Dan Quayle, 1988

We're going to have the best-educated American people in the world.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

This election is about who's going to be the next President of the United States!
— Vice President Dan Quayle, 1988

Don't forget about the importance of the family. It begins with the family. We're not going to redefine the family. Everybody knows the definition of the family. [Meaningful pause] A child. [Meaningful pause] A mother. [Meaningful pause] A father. There are other arrangements of the family, but that is a family and family values.

I've been very blessed with wonderful parents and a wonderful family, and I am proud of my family. Anybody turns to their family. I have a very good family. I'm very fortunate to have a very good family. I believe very strongly in the family. It's one of the things we have in our platform, is to talk about it.

I suppose three important things certainly come to my mind that we want to say thank you. The first would be our family. Your family, my family — which is composed of an immediate family of a wife and three children, a larger family with grandparents and aunts and uncles. We all have our family, whichever that may be ... The very beginnings of civilization, the very beginnings of this country, goes back to the family. And time and time again, I'm often reminded, especially in this Presidential campaign, of the importance of a family, and what a family means to this country. And so when you pay thanks I suppose the first thing that would come to mind would be to thank the Lord for the family.
— Vice President Dan Quayle

Dan Quayle on [Wikipedia].