And I do understand that women of your generation didn't necessarily learn to be comfortable with ambition in the same way and I know it can look very obnoxious and over-reaching. But we have to demand more power ourselves. You know? Otherwise, we all just get stuck serving powerful men.
All S1
S1 E15Unfinished Business
Elizabeth McCord's speech:
What is an even greater threat than nuclear weapons?
That which makes the use of them possible: hate.
Specifically, the blind hatred one group or nation can have for another.
That is why I am convinced that nationalism is the existential threat of our time.
Now I want to be clear.
Nationalism is not the same as patriotism.
It’s a perversion of patriotism.
Nationalism, the belief system held by those who attacked us, promotes the idea that inclusion and diversity represent weakness, that the only way to succeed is to give blind allegiance to the supremacy of one race over all others.
Nothing could be less American.
Patriotism, on the other hand, is about building each other up and embracing our diversity as the source of our nation’s strength.
“We the people” means all the people.
America’s heroes didn’t die for race or region.
They died for the ideals enshrined in our Constitution.
Above all, freedom from tyranny, which requires our unwavering support of a free press; freedom of religion, all religions; the right to vote, and making sure nothing infringes on any of those rights, which belong to us all.
Look where isolationism has gotten us in the past.
Two world wars.
Seventy million dead.
Never again can we go back to those dark times when fear and hatred, like a contagion, infected the world.
That, as much as ending the threat of nuclear war, is what today is about.
And it's why we must never lose sight of our common humanity, our common values, and our common decency.
I was reminded recently of our nation's founding motto, e pluribus unum, out of many, one.
13 disparate colonies became one country, one people.
And today we call on all Americans and people everywhere to reject the scourge of nationalism.
Because governments can't legislate tolerance or eradicate hate.
That's why each one of us has to find the beauty in our differences instead of the fear. Listen instead of reacting. Reach out instead of recoiling.
It's up to us. All of us.
Thank you.
You know I respect Henry, but he needs to be on the same page as you. Publicly.
We still have a year.
Practice makes perfect. Unless you convince your family that they're in it too, you won't win. It's as simple as that.
What do you think?
JJune
Well, of course she offered you the job. You're a hot ticket. You have an inside track to the White House not to mention a direct line to your mother. This town will take connections over anything else.
No reckless attack on our democracy will ever shake America's commitment to our core values. And any country that tries will face dire consequences so much worse than one lucky RPG hit.
Our founding fathers knew what people were capable of when they created the justice system. I think we should trust it to do its job as it always has.
Classic Russian move. Blame your opponents for your own dirty deeds.
Why does that always work?
If you want to make things better for the next generation, get rid of this notion that we're supposed to be invisible and self-effacing.
I don't want to be invisible. I just want to be worthy of the people who came before me.
Because real talk? It doesn't get any easier from here. You know better than most that sometimes this world, this country is not going to be fair. You won't always be seen for the creative, enthusiastic young men and women you are. So on the bad days, when you're tempted to give up you're going to have to find that belief in yourself. Because you can make it. I know, because I made it and you all are definitely smarter than me and I know because I read your essays.
We know how this works -- once we respond, China escalates and so on until the both of us go over an economic cliff, probably taking the rest of the world with us.
A few months of being locked out the Chinese markets and many of our pork producers, soybean farmers, they could go under.
I mean, a bunch of white guys were so enraged by the prospect of making space for someone like my daughter, like me, they would literally rather blow up the White House, rather destroy the country than share it. And also I can give you the names of at least five unarmed black people who have been killed by the police in the last six months. Just driving along and get pulled over and, boom, that's it.
You know the last Secretary of State to become President? James Buchanan. 150 years ago.
Well, even the Cubbies eventually won the World Series.
Did that work?
I don't know. I can't read that lady.
Yeah, me neither. She's either chill...
Or she's gonna kill somebody.
Ma'am, if I could put a finer point on it: Andrada is a chauvinist who is unlikely to meet with a woman whose last interaction left him with a deviated septum.
'No man left behind' isn't just a credo, it's a pledge we make to the enlisted and every second those soldiers aren't back is a breach of faith to those who serve.
These quotes come from Wikiquote's Madam Secretary pages and are available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.