“America has never seen itself as a national state like all others, but rather as an experiment in human freedom and democracy.”

If Iraq were to descend into chaos, the Europeans would feel the effects just as much as we would.

Love the people you think you’d want to be with in the hereafter.

To be different you must strive to be what no one else but you can be. Don’t be so concerned with the opinions of others; those who follow the quiet, creative voice from within are both fortunate and correct.

If universities want to save a little money, they ought to make some cutbacks in administration and in faculty people who teach one class a week.

If you look back at the first Gulf war, the Arabs sent forces, they sent money. So their interests in Iraq are clear, but they’re nowhere to be seen now. Why? Because right now, it’s dangerous to be seen as supporting the United States.

But the central point is that any campaign against Iraq, whatever the strategy, cost and risks, is certain to divert us for some indefinite period from our war on terrorism.

Russia right now is searching for its soul. It’s trying to figure out what it really is.

I came back to New York after college like any number of struggling performers, and you just find that niche where you can have some sort of impact. And for me that turned out to be comedy.

…there is no more effective public interest watchdog in Washington, D.C.

Democracy doesn’t just consist of holding elections.

My mother told me I was dancing before I was born. She could feel my toes tapping wildly inside her for months.

That is so personal, and it’s my pet peeve when people press you on it. And it’s always women who get asked! Is anybody saying that to George Clooney?

The world is all the richer for having a devil in it, so long as we keep our foot upon his neck.

After all, we didn’t bring democracy to Germany in 1945; Hitler destroyed democracy there first.

I’m not trying to keep anybody happy.

If you’re away from your house for a month, by the time you come back there’s someone else living in it.

In the United States we have a society pervaded from top to bottom by contempt for the law.

In the infancy of societies, the chiefs of state shape its institutions; later the institutions shape the chiefs of state.

The state of slavery is in its own nature bad.

In constitutional states, liberty is compensation for heavy taxes; in dictatorships, the subsititue is light taxes.

Every state need not start with state policing if they can’t fund it.

Each particular society begins to feel its strength, whence arises a state of war between different nations.

This is how Americans think. You believe that if something terrible happens to someone, they must have deserved it.

We are experiencing a real confusion here in the United States, you know. Why is it OK to drink, but it’s not OK to take drugs?