Scratch the surface of most cynics and you find a frustrated idealist — someone who made the mistake of converting his ideals into expectations.

The starry-eyed idealists of today have submerged their critical faculties beneath a tidal wave of slop marketed by those old hippies who now sell a user-friendly dilution of their original enlightenment.

Cynics are - beneath it all - only idealists with awkwardly high standards.

Scratch any cynic and you will find a disappointed idealist.

We must rekindle the fire of idealism in our society, for nothing suffocates the promise of America more than unbounded cynicism and indifference.

Why do we call all our generous ideas illusions, and the mean ones truths?