Alan Keyes

Dr. Alan Lee Keyes (born August 7, 1950) is an American politician and diplomat, considered one of the leading African Americans in the Republican Party.

Quotes

• "I think that's a way of Providence telling us, 'I love you all; I'd like to give you a chance. Wake up! Would you please wake up?" - on why abortion is to blame for the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon; Provo, Utah, May 7, 2004.

• "Colorblind means that when a colored person walks in, you suddenly go blind." - Keyes accuses the GOP of racism after it withheld financial support for his failing candidacy in 1992.

• "Homosexuals are not haunted by the prospect or possibility of procreation – because they're simply not capable of it. I think this is pretty obvious, isn't it?"

• "That means that an incestuous situation could easily arise in our society; it's more than likely to arise – not to mention every other kind of incestuous complication." - Keyes on lesbian couples having children through artificial insemination.

• "The right response of a chief executive in this state and in this nation, when faced with an order by a court that he conscientiously believes violates the Constitution he is sworn to respect, is to refuse their order!"

• "...the Second Amendment is really in the Constitution to give men like Bill Clinton something to think about when their ambition gets particularly overinflated." - Keyes giving a cryptic threat against President Clinton.

• "Alan Keyes's opinion of himself and the universe's opinion of him have fatally parted company." - Rick Brookhiser, National Review Online, 8 August 2004

• "I thought the Keyes weakness is painfully obvious, but here goes: The job of a political candidate is to attract people to a party's political philosophy and bring victory to the party on Election Day. In two U.S. Senate races and two presidential campaigns, Alan Keyes has done the exact opposite: shown a great ability to stampede voters away from his candidacy like a herd of panicking animals fleeing a huge volcanic eruption. [...] When voters listen to a successful candidate they get a strong feeling that this person can do the job and make life better. When voters listen to Alan Keyes, they get the perception, 'wow, this guy is stone cold nuts' and they run home to hide their children. We Republicans are the free market party, so look to Keyes's prior history in elections and trust the market." - Mike Murphy, political consultant, The Weekly Standard (online), 11 August 2004

• "On all the matters that touch upon the critical moral issues, Arnold Schwarzenegger is on the evil side." - Keyes denouncing more moderate GOP speakers like Schwarzenegger at the GOP Convention in 2004.

• "I've dealt with Keyes personally...His ego is too big for the Senate, Presidency, and probably God." -- Greg Blankenship, running an anti-Obama website.

• "A Keyes speech on the moral erosion of America is one of those transcendent experiences where you just have to be there. It's hard to explain how he touches the soul of an audience, and saying that he's 'silver-tongued' (as everyone does) only tarnishes the picture by inadequacy." -- David R. Boldt, writing in The Baltimore Sun, Nov. 29, 1995.

• "The first principle of a Keyes administration, it will apply in foreign policy, it will apply in domestic policy, it will apply everywhere. There is a God, and we are not him! I will not join the Clinton Democrats who worship government as their god! I will not join the Dole Republicans who worship power as their god! I will not join the Forbes Republicans who worship money as their god! I will stand where the founders of this nation stood, and I will give my respect and allegiance to the creator God who is the ground of justice and who is the ground of all our human rights!" --Alan Keyes, January 27, 1996 at the Louisiana Republican Convention.

• "While they complain about candidates pandering to special-interest groups, 217 years of this republic have shown that deep down people want candidates who strive to be all things to all men. People say they want office-seekers who are candid, frank, straightforward, genuine, who tell the truth even when it hurts. Who are on the up-and-up, guileless, unartful, undesigning, unequivocal. But nobody has won running on that platform, including Lincoln, FDR and Reagan, and you will be no exception. Voters elect only candidates who are deceptive, duplicitous, bluffers, cunning, crafty and Machiavellian. That's because voters want politicians like themselves. The media agrees. So why are you out of step? Thus, you've botched your campaign. You're going to lose by a landslide. I accuse you of being politically pure, clean, pristine, impeccable and untarnished. Your very presence embarrasses the system because you don't play by the historic rules." - Thomas Roeser to Keyes in the Chicago Sun Times.

• "I deeply resent the destruction of federalism represented by Hillary Clinton's willingness to go into a state she doesn't even live in and pretend to represent the people there. So I certainly wouldn't imitate it." - Keyes appearing on Fox News in March 2000