I have no idols. I admire work, dedication and competence.

Teaching is the only major occupation of man for which we have not yet developed tools that make an average person capable of competence and performance. In teaching we rely on the 'naturals', the ones who somehow know how to teach.

Power is competence.

Basically, to lead without a title is to derive your power within the organisation not from your position but from your competence, effectiveness, relationships, excellence, innovation and ethics.

Fathers and mothers have lost the idea that the highest aspiration they might have for their children is for them to be wise... specialized competence and success are all that they can imagine.

Marriage, laws, the police, armies and navies are the mark of human incompetence.

In 1987, I had my first opportunity to provide 'advice and consent' on a Supreme Court nominee. At that time, I stated that the qualifications essential for evaluating a nominee for the bench included 'integrity, character, legal competence and ability, experience, and philosophy and judicial temperament.' On that test, Elena Kagan fails.

The situation around Terri Schiavo was a deeply held conflict over what to do if someone isn't going to return to consciousness or competence. Who will decide? Even there, where we had settled legal rules, we still had disagreement. We're torn about these things.

The hijab, or sikh turban, or Jewish skullcap are all explicit symbols, but they do not represent a threat or affront to others, and have no bearing on the competence, skills and intelligence of a person.

For four years, I listened to stories of intelligence failures, and it wasn't due to incompetence of anyone in the system, but that the system is so arcane.

Success means at least you are finding full potential to who you are in terms of your intelligence, your capability and competence: you are finding full expression to who you are. This is important.

The only foes that threaten America are the enemies at home, and these are ignorance, superstition and incompetence.

I think every chef, not just in America, but across the world, has a double-edged sword - two jackets, one that's driven, a self-confessed perfectionist, thoroughbred, hate incompetence and switch off the stove, take off the jacket and become a family man.

Like all alchemists, Trump seeks to convert dross into gold, to toss a broth of his incompetence, denial, delay, deception, and failure into some supernatural alembic and extract political advantage.

If you improve education by teaching for competence, eliminating schooling, and connecting with students, the test scores will improve.

The criteria for serving one's country should be competence, courage and willingness to serve. When we deny people the chance to serve because of their sexual orientation, we deprive them of their rights of citizenship, and we deprive our armed forces the service of willing and capable Americans.

Luck is always the last refuge of laziness and incompetence.

Thanks to the competence, love of God, our country's security and stability, endowed wealth, integrated infrastructure and quality services, the U.A.E. turned into the world's renowned destination for tourism, investment and business management: the interface of choice for hosting major cultural events, artistic and sports, in the world.

Arrogance, ignorance, and incompetence. Not a pretty cocktail of personality traits in the best of situations. No sirree. Not a pretty cocktail in an office-mate and not a pretty cocktail in a head of state. In fact, in a leader, it's a lethal cocktail.

Competence, like truth, beauty, and contact lenses, is in the eye of the beholder.

President Obama and members of his administration constantly express rage and anger over events totally within their control. It's an odd and unsettling fact of American life that so many Americans seem to think that such expressions of frustration should substitute for actual competence.

It's up to the artist to use language that can be understood, not hide it in some private code. Most of these jokers don't even want to use language you and I know or can learn . . . they would rather sneer at us and be smug, because we 'fail' to see what they are driving at. If indeed they are driving at anything--obscurity is usually the refuge of incompetence.

Some people will never be highly successful not because of their lack of competence but because of the lack of welcoming new ideas and new people into their lives.

Dreams built with trust (character and competence) ignite the best in each and everyone of us. We must keep dreaming. We must continue to light the fuse of each other's dreams so that one day, we can ALL dream together.