The Contender (2000) - Quotes

The Greatest Show On Earth Awaits

Taglines: Welcome To The Greatest Show On Earth

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Assassination Without Violence

Taglines: Sometimes you can assassinate a leader without firing a shot.

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Confidential Discussion Between Leaders

President Jackson Evans: [outside the White House, walking away from the party] Well can I tell you I'm just bustin to know what really happened?

Laine Hanson: You mean, this would just be between Laine and the President?

President Jackson Evans: I'll go one better. This will be between Laine and Jackson.

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Irony in Political Characterization

Shelly Runyon: There's a reason they call me Honest Shell.

President Jackson Evans: Irony, Shelly.

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Moral Integrity in Political Struggles

Laine Hanson: Come on, Kermit. If we do that, we are no better than he is.

Kermit Newman: We are no better than he is!

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The Promise of Greatness and Its Challenges

Shelly Runyon: [[John F. Kennedy|Kennedy; [Abraham Lincoln|Lincoln] Greatness is the orphan of urgency, Laine. Greatness only emerges when we need it most... in time of war or calamity. I can't ask somebody to be a ] or a ]. They were men created by their times. What I... What I can ask for... is the promise of greatness. And that, Madam Senator... you don't have.

Laine Hanson: Well, then... I just wouldn't be using sex as leverage... if I were you, Sheldon. Because, you know, there's one thing you don't want. It's a woman with her finger on the button who isn't getting laid.

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Power, Perception, and Public Opinion

Laine Hanson: It seems to me that all you can claim about me — claim — is that I had sex.

Shelly Runyon: Deviant sex.

Laine Hanson: Oh, deviant? Who says it was deviant?

Shelly Runyon: I do. What I say the American people will believe. And do you know why? Because I will have a very big microphone in front of me.

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Confrontation Over Small Talk

Shelly Runyon: So, how are Will and the boy?

Laine Hanson: Let's forego the small talk today Shelly, I'm not in the mood.

Shelly Runyon: Let the big talk begin.

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Desire for Controversial and Unconventional Content

Kermit Newman: [Trying to dig up dirt on Shelly Runyon] I want something EMBARRASSING! Something sexual! Little boys, midgets, that sort of thing! Cows! I don't give a goddamn!

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Public Perception and Political Image

Kermit Newman: The people of this nation can stomach quite a bit. But the one thing they can't stomach is the image of a vice president with a mouthful of cock.

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Subjectivity Over Objectivity in Leadership

Shelly Runyon: Take a magic marker, cross out the word "objectivity". Your constituents want you for your opinions, your philosophy, for your subjectivity.

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Sticking to Our Guns: A Loaded Difference

Shelly Runyon: [to President Jackson Evans] We're both sticking to our guns. The difference is, mine are loaded.

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A Call for Decency in Leadership

President Jackson Evans: [points at Rep. Shelley Runyon] I should have come down here and pointed my finger your way... ... pointed my finger YOUR way, and asked "Have you no decency, sir?

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Power, Pettiness, and the State of Democracy

President Jackson Evans: [addressing the Congress; [Napoleon; pointing at Runyon; he notices Runyon exiting] Thank you. ] once said when asked to explain the lack of great statesmen in the world, that to get power, you need to display absolute pettiness. To exercise power, you need to show true greatness. Such pettiness and such greatness are rarely found in one person. I look upon the events of the past weeks and I've never come so to grips with that quotation. So, ladies and gentlemen of this Congress, it pains my soul to tell you that you have brought blood and shame under this great dome. Your leadership has raised the stakes of hate to a level where we can no longer separate the demagogue from the truly inspired. And believe this, there are traitors among us. And I'm not talking about those of you who sided against your party leadership. I'm talking about those of you who were patriots to your party but traitors to the necessary end result: That of righteousness, the truth, the concept of making the American dream blind to gender. And you know, I am not free of blame. Right from the start, I should've come down here, pointed a finger your way - pointed a finger your way , and asked you, Have you no decency, sir? Yesterday, I met - Mr. Runyon, you may walk out on me, you may walk out on this body, but you cannot walk out on the will of the American people. Americans are a good people. They're a just people, Mr. Runyon, and they will forgive you, but they will not forget. Hate and ego have no place residing in what my good friend Laine Hanson calls the chapel of democracy.

Understanding Right and Wrong

President Jackson Evans: [about Rep. Reginald Webster] Well, he may not know his right from his left, but he does know the difference between right and wrong.

Desire for Easy Paths to Success

President Jackson Evans: [to Gov. Hathaway] Who doesn't want a shortcut to greatness?

Determination Against Political Opponents

President Jackson Evans: I'll die before Shelly Runyon checkmates me.

A Vision for the Democratic Party's Future

President Jackson Evans: [to Gov. Hathaway] You're the future of the Democratic party. And you always will be.

Reflection on Political Ideology and Consequences

President Jackson Evans: [after missing a shot while bowling] Well, that's what I get for my Leftist tendencies.

A Stand for Democracy and Human Rights

Laine Hanson: [closing remarks at Congressional confirmation hearing] Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen of the committee. Remarkably enough, it seems that I have some explaining to do. So, let me be absolutely clear. I stand for a woman's right to choose. I stand for the elimination of the death penalty. I stand for a strong and growing armed forces because we must stomp out genocide on this planet, and I believe that that is a cause worth dying for. I stand for seeing every gun taken out of every home, period. I stand for making the selling of cigarettes to our youth a federal offense. I stand for term limits and campaign reform. And, Mr. Chairman, I stand for the separation of church and state, and the reason that I stand for that is the same reason that I believe our forefathers did. It is not there to protect religion from the grasp of government, but to protect our government from the grasp of religious fanaticism. I may be an atheist, but that does not mean I do not go to church. I do go to church. The church I go to is the one that emancipated the slaves, that gave women the right to vote, that gave us every freedom that we hold dear. My church is this very chapel of Democracy that we sit in together, and I do not need God to tell me what are my moral absolutes. I need my heart, my brain, and this church.