Best 68 quotes of Ed Koch on MyQuotes

Anybody who suggests that I run for governor is no friend of mine. It's a terrible position, and besides, it requires living in Albany, which is small-town life at its worst.

Be different-if you don't have the facts and knowledge required, simply listen. When word gets around that you can listen when others tend to talk, you will be treated as a sage.

But enough of me. Lets talk about you. What do you think of me?

Carter couldn't elect a dog-catcher.

Citizens, thank you for all your birthday wishes. I am 88 years old today and still lucky to live in the greatest city in the world.

Clinton has more important things to worry about. He not only risks being destroyed historically, like Afghanistan's Buddha statues; he also could end up going to jail.

Deals are my art form. Other people paint beautifully on canvas or write wonderful poetry. I like making deals, preferably big deals. That's how I get my kicks.

Don't tell me this is a difficult problem. If it weren't difficult, it wouldn't be a problem.

God gave me a very good hand to play over my 88 years. I have no regrets.

Have confidence in your decisions. Make them expeditiously, and stay with them as long as you believe you are correct no matter what others say. However, when you conclude you were in error, do not hesitate to announce the error publicly and change course.

Have you ever lived in the suburbs? It's sterile. It's nothing. It's wasting your life, and people do not wish to waste their lives once they've seen New York! This rural American thing - I'm telling you, it's a joke.

However, they ignore the fact that the First Amendment is intended to protect only against government sanctions for exercising free speech rights, not private actions.

I changed the city of New York. I gave people back their morale.

I don't believe that in our society that we should have guns.

I don't want to leave Manhattan, even when I'm gone.

If I traveled to the end of the rainbow as Dame Fortune did intend, Murphy would be there to tell me the pot's at the other end.

If I were running against Chuck Schumer. I would take every one of his Sunday press releases - and there are 52 for as many years as he's been there - and I would ask, 'How many of the things he said he was proposing became law?' I doubt many.

If they don't want to pay for it, they can stop drinking it.

If you agree with me on 9 out of 12 issues, vote for me. If you agree with me on 12 out of 12 issues, see a psychiatrist.

If you don't like the President, it costs you 90 bucks to fly to Washington to picket. If you don't like the governor, it costs you 60 bucks to fly to Albany to picket. If you don't like me - 90 cents.

If you seek violence, we will seek to put you in jail.

If you turn your back on these people, you yourself are an animal. You may be a well-dressed animal, but you are nevertheless an animal.

I happen to believe that there is nothing wrong with homosexuality. It’s whatever God made you. It happens that I’m heterosexual, but I don’t care about that. I do care about protecting the rights of 10 percent of our population who are homosexual and who don’t have the ability to protect their rights.

I have a social life. But I don't discuss it.

I intend to vote for President George W. Bush in the next election, because in my view, he is best able to wage the war against international terrorism.

I know many writers who first dictate passages, then polish what they have dictated. I speak, then I polish - occasionally I do windows.

I love being the mayor. I want to be the mayor forever.

I'm confident President Obama will continue his unambiguous commitment to the Jewish state in his second term.

I'm just a simple Jewish boy from the Bronx.

I'm not the type to get ulcers. I give them.

In action be primitive; in foresight, a strategist.

I probably have another two or three years. Or I can pass tomorrow, but it doesn't make a difference to me.

I said, to be a New Yorker you have to live here for six months, and if at the end of the six months you find you walk faster, talk faster, think faster, you're a New Yorker.

It is not possible to remake the world. You can fix parts, but you can't remake the world.

It's a lot more fun being a critic than being the one criticized.

I wake up every morning and say to myself, Well, I'm still in New York. Thank you, God.

I was born at the age of twelve on a Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer lot.

I was drafted into the Army when I was 19 and came out at age 22. Most people that I knew didn't think they'd come home alive. I didn't think I would either, so I was happy when I did.

Jews have always thought that having someone elevated with his head above the grass was not good for the Jews. I never felt that way. I believe that you have to stand up.

Life is indeed precious, and I believe the death penalty helps affirm this fact.

Like many others, I'm deeply sympathetic to the huge numbers of people looking to come here today to escape suffering and poverty in their own lands. But as a country, we cannot afford to have a total open-door policy without any restrictions on entry.

Many of the self-described "political refugees" who come here make stopovers in other countries on their way to the U.S., in places where they would be free to have as many children as they want. But they choose to continue on to the U.S. Why? Because it is more economically attractive.

Maybe he just looks good compared to the bores he's running against.

Should we be rewriting history just to make people feel good? That's not history, that's psychiatry.

Stereotypes lose their power when the world is found to be more complex than the stereotype would suggest. When we learn that individuals do not fit the group stereotype, then it begins to fall apart.

The art of creation is older than the art of killing.

The best way to lose weight is to close your mouth - something very difficult for a politician. Or watch your food - just watch it, don't eat it.

The Chinese describe themselves as political refugees. Many base that claim on China's strict population laws, which allow them to have only one child. But if we accept them as bona fide political refugees for that reason, doesn't it follow that people living in countries where abortion is illegal (such as Ireland and Poland) should also receive political asylum? After all, their country's policy is forcing them to give birth to unwanted children.

The fireworks begin today. Each diploma is a lighted match. Each one of you is a fuse.

The key to success in politics: Never forget, seldom forgive.