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Time & Perspective Quote by Jon Huntsman, Jr.

"Politics is a lot of serendipity. You're in the right place and the right time and you've got the right message, and it either connects for you or, or it doesn't"

About this Quote

Huntsman’s line is a politician’s version of killing the myth without killing the audience’s hope. Calling politics “a lot of serendipity” flatters the democratic fantasy that anyone can break through, then quietly narrows it: you need the right place, right time, right message. That triple “right” turns chance into a checklist, implying that success isn’t just about virtue or competence but about alignment with a moment that voters are ready to hear. It’s modest on the surface, strategic underneath.

The hedging syntax does real work. “And it either connects for you or, or it doesn’t” performs humility and realism in the same breath. The stuttered “or, or” reads like someone backing away from sounding too deterministic. It also preempts blame. If a campaign fails, it’s not necessarily a bad candidate, a bad platform, or a bad strategy; sometimes the wiring just doesn’t catch. That’s a useful alibi in a profession obsessed with postmortems.

Context matters: Huntsman has been a competent, bilingual, résumé-heavy figure who never quite became a national mood. As governor, diplomat, and would-be presidential contender, he embodied the kind of meritocratic preparedness that modern campaigns claim to reward. This quote reframes that mismatch: politics isn’t a pure merit contest; it’s an arena where timing can outrank qualifications. The subtext is a warning to consultants and commentators who pretend elections are fully engineerable, and a gentle reminder to voters that “connection” is its own power - irrational, emotional, and often decisive.

Quote Details

TopicMotivational
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Citation Formats

APA Style (7th ed.)
Jr., Jon Huntsman,. (2026, January 15). Politics is a lot of serendipity. You're in the right place and the right time and you've got the right message, and it either connects for you or, or it doesn't. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/politics-is-a-lot-of-serendipity-youre-in-the-142154/

Chicago Style
Jr., Jon Huntsman,. "Politics is a lot of serendipity. You're in the right place and the right time and you've got the right message, and it either connects for you or, or it doesn't." FixQuotes. January 15, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/politics-is-a-lot-of-serendipity-youre-in-the-142154/.

MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Politics is a lot of serendipity. You're in the right place and the right time and you've got the right message, and it either connects for you or, or it doesn't." FixQuotes, 15 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/politics-is-a-lot-of-serendipity-youre-in-the-142154/. Accessed 13 Feb. 2026.

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Jon Huntsman, Jr. (born March 26, 1960) is a Politician from USA.

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