“For me, dressing is always a question of principle, respect, a sense of order, not to disguise myself, even in rotten places.”

The European Union should not be prescribing an identity. We know what that’s like, when a government tells its people how it should look; what it should be doing. That’s the first step towards totalitarianism.

I work even when I am on vacation. You know that line by Stéphane Mallarmé, “All earthly existence must ultimately be contained in a book”? I am the kind of person who finds life interesting only if it is translated into writing, if it is parsed into words.

There is a true weakness in American thought today: their incapacity to be interested in the intelligence of evil.

In general, Europeans need to get a wider perspective on the problem of Islamism.

I would hope that Europe always has a privileged relationship with the United States. The alternatives are not attractive.

God is dead but my hair is perfect.

A politician has finally understood that politics is not only about the closing of a mine in Ohio-it is also about the will to reach out, to embrace the world of today’s young Americans. That way, young Americans may eventually reconcile with politics.

The terrorists exist, and I think we must speak to them, not to establish a dialogue-since for serious terrorists that is unfortunately out of the question – but to learn how their brains work, to be better able to fight them.

Look at writer and political theorist Charles Maurras in France. The philosopher Martin Heidegger in Germany. The radical Islamists of today!

Europe needs to develop a sense of collective history – we need to write books from a European perspective, to teach it in schools as well.

I really like the United State, its relationship to space and time, its interest in mobility, its cosmopolitanism.

America creates myths by focusing a lot of energy on its history and using it – – not always, but sometimes – for constructive purposes.

I reject the idea that there is some sort of existential “clash of civilizations.” I am an interventionist, but not a militarist. War should always be a last resort.

France is a country where thinking is supposed to be furtive, invisible, almost clandestine. France is a country of cliques and sects.

The euro is a great achievement. It’s a symbolic achievement. But, the European constitution was a missed opportunity.

The only successful revolution of this century is totalitarianism.

If only men came made to order. It’s so hard to find a decent fellow.

God does not change us in order to love us. He loves us in order to change us.

Take the joy and bear the sorrow, looking past your hopes and fears: learn to recognize the measured dance that orders all our years.

When I’m out, maybe I’m looking at the fried chicken, but I know I need to order the grilled.

I really do believe that in order to overcome our environmental shortcomings.

The first rule of all air combat is to see the opponent first.

From my childhood, obedience was something I could not get out of my system. When I entered the armed service at the age of twenty-seven, I found being obedient not a bit more difficult than it had been during my life to that point. It was unthinkable that I would not follow orders.

All I have to do to make me feel like a new and younger man is to order three new suits of clothes.