63 Quotes by Todd Gitlin

My book is focused on the power of the American state, not least because the government of the United States governs so much that the case could be made that everybody around the world ought to have a vote in determining some of its policies.

We are in the midst of a tremendous global revolution, ... and the consequences are on a scale that are hitherto unprecedented.

People who feel that their ways of life are threatened or feel generally anxious or confused about the way things are going are disposed to look for causes.

Again, the only trends that interest the corporate boys and girls are demographic and businesslike. I doubt the think tank reports interest them much.

You're in the news business and you're in the business of arresting the attention of people and prying them away from what they take for granted. They must read the next day's paper and so on. While the desire to gain attention is a dynamic in journalism, it's not the only one. The predominant dynamic since journalism's inception has been the desire to capture the attention of people. Another dynamic is the extension of democratic enlightenment.

Access journalism has become the ends, not the means.

It's too hot to handle. He was scathing toward Bush and it was absolutely devastating. They don't know how to handle such a pointed and aggressive criticism.

It's not a bunch of green-haired kids with punctures in their faces.

The fancy term for what America has squandered in the past year and a half or so is legitimacy.