“There is an irony that the most active anti-gay groups are Al-Qaeda and the American Right wing.”

The fact that theyre a congressionally chartered group should no more incline people to give to that group than the fact that its National Pickle Month should make them eat more pickles.

I should have voted for the first Iraq war. George Bush did that one very well. I had been skeptical. I was afraid that George Bush was going to treat the first Iraq war the way his son treated the second.

Lawyers are very, very good at keeping you out of prison, but they will sacrifice your reputation and credibility to do so.

I am very proud of the role I played in getting legal equality for people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender, and in helping get rid of the prejudice by being visible about it, helping to block the conviction of Bill Clinton of impeachment.

The rights of the people who have done terrible things are hard to defend. You have to keep pointing out, the question is the process to determine whether they’ve done the terrible things.

[Democrats] are trying on every front to increase the role of government.

There is a correlation between people who attack same-sex marriage and have difficulty maintaining their own.

What’s troubling is that the Republicans to defend Mr. DeLay are weakening the ethics process.

The issue is not that morals be applied to public policy, it’s that conservatives bring public policy to spheres of our lives where it should not enter.

We don’t get ourselves dry cleaned.

I have been mislabeled as a big advocate of low-income home ownership over rental.

If Bob Barr (conservative republican congressman from Georgia) caught on fire and I was holding a bucket of water, it would be great act of discipline to pour it on him. I would do it, but I’d hate myself in the morning.

Regarding homophobia in general, the good news is that there is a lot less of it than there used to be. The bad news is that it ever existed in the first place, and the worse news is that it remains far stronger than is healthy for a society dedicated in theory to equality under the law.

Conservatives believe that from the standpoint of the federal government, life begins at conception and ends at birth.

I had always been interested in politics. I had assumed – for two reasons, being Jewish and being gay back in the late ’50s, early ’60s – that I would never be elected or anything, but I would participate as an activist.

Donald Trump has done more for getting people to understand the importance of public policy that respond to public needs in an affirmative way than anything we could have done on our own.

He (son Jason) doesn’t see me as a (gay) icon, he sees me as his mother who touches his hair too much. No, I love being an icon to anybody. Equal rights, you know?

In the context of the great debates about identity politics – are you gay or straight, nationalist or republican, British or English and so on.

Gays are beginning to realize what blacks learned long ago: Unless you are out here fighting for yourself then nobody else will help you. I think the gay community has a moral obligation to continue the fight.

We need laws that protect everyone – men and women, straights and gays, regardless of sexual perversion…ah, persuasion.

The cozy fire is bright and gay, The merry kettle boils away and hums a cheerful song. I sing the saucer and the cup; Pray, Mary, fill the teapot up, And do not make it strong

My activism did not spring from my being gay, or, for that matter, from my being black. Rather, it is rooted fundamentally in my Quaker upbringing and the values that were instilled in me by my grandparents who reared me.

The big thing is to make this country – quit discriminating against people just because they’re gay. You don’t have to agree with it, but they have a constitutional right to be gay. They’re American citizens.

I look to an out gay man or woman as pretty much what I would aspire to. The strength that it takes to do that and the floodgates that open and what they pay for it.