Leadership Quote by Marion Barry

A confession that doubles as a campaign slogan: Marion Barry’s line is built to neutralize the past without ever dwelling in it. “I have to admit” signals humility, but the admission is carefully rationed. He concedes effort (“didn’t do as much as I should have”) rather than wrongdoing, shifting critique from ethics to output. That’s a politician’s sleight of hand: accept a manageable fault, then pivot to competence.

The second clause - “but now we’re getting it done” - swaps accountability for momentum. The “we” is strategic, too: it folds voters and city workers into the achievement narrative, making any success collective and any lingering failure diffuse. It’s a familiar redemption arc, tuned for a public that’s tired of scandal coverage and hungry for tangible improvements: jobs, services, functioning streets. Barry is selling deliverables as absolution.

Then comes the clincher: “It’s not where you’ve been but where you’re going.” The phrasing borrows from self-help and revival rhetoric, not wonky governance. It’s forward-facing, moralistic, and deliberately vague - perfect for a figure whose biography was always part public policy, part public theater. In Washington, D.C., where Barry remained a complicated symbol of pride, defiance, and disappointment, the line asks constituents to treat history as prologue rather than evidence. The subtext is blunt: you can keep judging me, or you can take the progress I’m offering.