George Soros

On Terror: “How can we escape from the trap that the terrorists have set us?” he asked. “Only by recognizing that the war on terrorism cannot be won by waging war. We must, of course, protect our security; but we must also correct the grievances on which terrorism feeds…. Crime requires police work, not military action.”

On the Bush Administration: “An open society is a society which allows its members the greatest possible degree of freedom in pursuing their interests compatible with the interests of others,” Soros said. “The Bush administration merely has a narrower definition of self-interest. It does not include the interests of others.”

On the Bush Administration: “The supremacist ideology of the Bush Administration stands in opposition to the principles of an open society, which recognize that people have different views and that nobody is in possession of the ultimate truth. The supremacist ideology postulates that just because we are stronger than others, we know better and have right on our side. The very first sentence of the September 2002 National Security Strategy (the President’s annual laying out to Congress of the country’s security objectives) reads, ‘The great struggles of the twentieth century between liberty and totalitarianism ended with a decisive victory for the forces of freedom and a single sustainable model for national success: freedom, democracy, and free enterprise.'”

On Philanthropy: “I’m not doing my philanthropic work, out of any kind of guilt, or any need to create good public relations. I’m doing it because I can afford to do it, and I believe in it.”

On Stock Market Bubbles: “Stock market bubbles don’t grow out of thin air. They have a solid basis in reality, but reality as distorted by a misconception.”