fear

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed -- and thus clamorous to be led to safety -- by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.
~ H.L. Mencken 1880-1956 American journalist, satarist, social critic, anti-establishment figure, considered by scholars as one of America's greatest writers, known as 'The Sage of Baltimore.'

elections

Each candidate behaved well in the hope of being judged worthy of election. However, this system was disastrous when the city had become corrupt. For then it was not the most virtuous but the most powerful who stood for election, and the weak, even if virtuous, were too frightened to run for office. ~ Niccolo Machiavelli  (Italian writer and statesman; Florentine patriot, author of 'The Prince') 

An election cannot give a country a firm sense of direction if it has two or more national parties which merely have different names but are as alike in their principles and aims as two peas in the same pod. ~ Franklin D. Roosevelt  (American 32nd US President,1933-45, cousin of Theodore Roosevelt, 26th US president,1882-1945)  

If the United States of America or Britain is having elections, they don't ask for observers from Africa or from Asia. But when we have elections, they want observers. ~  Nelson Mandela  (South African Statesman; First democratically elected State President of South Africa (1994), 1993 Nobel Prize for Peace, b.1918)  

Elections are won by men and women chiefly because most people vote against somebody rather than for somebody. ~ Franklin Pierce Adams (American Journalist, Columnist and Translator, (1881-1960)  

Win or lose, we go shopping after the election. ~ Imelda Marcos