Great Throughts Treasury

"I love pitting people against each other. My whole life is based on that. It brings out the best in people and the worst in people. If the worst comes out, you don't want them working for you."

"You must work well with others and be loyal to your team. Disloyalty is the worst of all traits."

"You have to remain cool under fire and let criticism roll off you. Good leaders handle conflict easily and bad ones are eaten up by it."

"You have to love what you're doing. I've never seen anyone succeed who didn't love what they were doing."

"As long as your going to be thinking anyway, think big. "

"In the end, you're measured not by how much you undertake but by what you finally accomplish. "

"A little more moderation would be good. Of course, my life hasn't exactly been one of moderation."

"A certificate of live birth is not the same thing by any stretch of the imagination as a birth certificate."

"A lot of people feel very good about Mitt Romney and I think he's going to do a great job."

"A well-educated black has a tremendous advantage over a well-educated white in terms of the job market. I think sometimes a black may think they don't have an advantage or this and that.... I've said on one occasion, even about myself, if I were starting off today, I would love to be a well-educated black, because I believe they do have an actual advantage."

"All of the women on 'The Apprentice' flirted with me — consciously or unconsciously. That's to be expected."

"A lot of people are questioning [Barack Obama's] birth certificate. They're questioning the authenticity of his birth certificate. I've been known as being a very smart guy for a long time. I don't consider myself birther or not birther, but there are some major questions here and the press doesn't wanna cover it. The press just refuses to cover it. Now if that were somebody else, they would be covering it, and they'd be throwing people out of office. But they don't want to cover it. So it's interesting."

"Because if you're not born in the United States, you cannot be president. And, there is a real question. And if this birth certificate exists, you know what I get a kick out of? The Governor of Hawaii says, "I remember when he was born 50 years ago." I doubt it. I think this guy should be investigated. I doubt it. He remembers when Obama was born? Give me a break! He's just trying to do something for his party. The fact is, if you're not born in the United States, you cannot be president. He is having a hard time — he spent millions of dollars trying to get away from this issue, millions of dollars in legal fees trying to get away from this issue. And I'll tell you what, I brought it up just routinely and all of a sudden, a lot of facts are emerging, and I'm starting to wonder myself whether or not he was born in this country."

"But I believe in fair trade, and I will tell you, I have many, many friends heading up corporations, and people that do just business in China, they say it's virtually impossible. It's very, very hard to come into China. And yet, we welcome them with open arms."

"China gets their oil from Libya. Why isn't China involved? They're going out spending billions of dollars a day on trying to take over the world economically. And we're spending billions and billions and billions of dollars on policing the world. Why isn't China involved with Libya? That - we don't get oil from Libya, China does."

"Anyone who thinks my story is anywhere near over is sadly mistaken."

"Do you mind if I sit back a little? Because your breath is very bad."

"Don't get sidetracked. If you do get sidetracked, get back on track as soon as possible. Ultimately sidetracking kills you."

"Every time you walk down the street people are screaming, 'You're fired!'"

"Everything in life is luck."

"Experience taught me a few things. One is to listen to your gut, no matter how good something sounds on paper. The second is that you're generally better off sticking with what you know. And the third is that sometimes your best investments are the ones you don't make."

"I do have my ducks in line if I want to do it, but I'd love to see the Republicans pick somebody that was going to win and take over this country and frankly, to use the expression, 'Make America great again.'"

"I do what I do out of pure enjoyment. Hopefully, nobody does it better. There's a beauty to making a great deal. It's my canvas. And I like painting it."

"Friendship can be really tested only in bad times."

"Get going. Move forward. Aim High. Plan a takeoff. Don't just sit on the runway and hope someone will come along and push the airplane. It simply won't happen. Change your attitude and gain some altitude. Believe me, you'll love it up here."

"I am no stranger to working hard. I have done it all my life. As a result I have become accustomed to expecting success in everything I do. Some people call me lucky, but I know better."

"I could never have imagined that firing 67 people on national television would actually make me more popular, especially with the younger generation."

"Getting things done in this country, if you want to build something, if you want to start a company, it's getting to be virtually impossible with all of the bureaucracy and all of the approvals."

"He lost the popular vote by a lot and won the election. We should have a revolution in this country!"

"I could take the greatest deal-makers of all time and they've always had something that didn't quite work out. You never want to put yourself in the position where something not working out is bigger than what you are and therefore takes you down. It's got to be in smaller chunks. In all cases, I want to learn something from things that didn't quite work out and learn, so that it doesn't happen again or so that in the future, you make great decisions. You don't want to make the same mistake twice and you have to learn that early on in your life."

"How to get rich ... whenever I meet people, that's usually what they want to know from me. You ask a banker how he makes bread. You ask a billionaire how he makes money."

"I have made the tough decisions, always with an eye toward the bottom line. Perhaps it's time America was run like a business."

"I feel a lot of people listen to what I have to say."

"I don't make deals for the money. I've got enough, much more than I'll never need. I do it to do it. Other people paint beautifully on canvas or write wonderful poetry. I like making deals, preferably big deals. That's how I get my kicks."

"I heard he [Barack Obama] was a terrible student, terrible. How does a bad student go to Columbia and then to Harvard? I'm thinking about it, I'm certainly looking into it. Let him show his records."

"I saw a report yesterday. There's so much oil, all over the world, they don't know where to dump it. And Saudi Arabia says, 'Oh, there's too much oil.' They - they came back yesterday. Did you see the report? They want to reduce oil production. Do you think they're our friends? They're not our friends."

"I don’t do it for the money. I’ve got enough, much more than I’ll ever need. I do it to do it. Deals are my art form."

"I love beautiful women, and beautiful women love me. It has to be both ways."

"I get up, take a shower and wash my hair. Then I read the newspapers and watch the news on television, and slowly the hair dries. It takes about an hour. I don't use the blow dryer. Once it's dry I comb it. Once I have it the way I like it — even though nobody else likes it — I spray it and it's good for the day."

"I mean, there's no arguing. There is no anything. There is no beating around the bush. "You're fired" is a very strong term."

"I like thinking big. If you're going to be thinking anything, you might as well think big."

"I support health care for people. I want people well taken care of. But I also want health care that we can afford as a country. I have people and friends closing down their businesses because of Obamacare."

"I think George Will is somebody that said recently that the Republicans will not lose, as a Republican, that the Republicans will not win the election. I think it was a terrible statement."

"I think Ronald Reagan was one of the great presidents, period, not just recently. I thought he had the demeanor. I thought he had the bearing. I thought he had the thought process."

"I try to learn from the past, but I plan for the future by focusing exclusively on the present. That's were the fun is."

"I was a great student at a great school, Wharton School of Finance."

"I wasn't satisfied just to earn a good living. I was looking to make a statement."

"If you look - look at - I mean, look at what's going on with your gasoline prices. They're going to go to $5, $6, $7 and we don't have anybody in Washington that calls OPEC and says, 'Fellas, it's time. It's over. You're not going to do it anymore.'"

"If you're interested in 'balancing' work and pleasure, stop trying to balance them. Instead make your work more pleasurable."

"If you're going to be thinking, you may as well think big."