“They are just really stupid people in Hollywood. You write them a script, and they say they love it, they absolutely love it. Then they say, ‘But doesn’t it need a small dog, and an Eskimo, and shouldn’t it be set in New Guinea?’ And you say, ‘But it is a sophisticated romantic comedy set in Paris.’”

Why do elites hate the poor? It’s xenophobia. They don’t know any poor people – except their off-the-books Brazilian nanny and illegal immigrant cleaning lady from Upper Revolta who don’t speak English.

Maybe climate change is a threat, and maybe climate change has been tarted up by climatologists trolling for research grant cash. It doesn’t matter.

Feeling good about government is like looking on the bright side of any catastrophe. When you quit looking on the bright side, the catastrophe is still there.

The importance of local governance may not be obvious to an America accustomed to treating city and state downfalls with doses of federal comeuppance. Sometimes there’s a reason for that – the Civil War. More often, all reasoning seems absent – No Child Left Behind.

I like to think of my behavior in the sixties as a ‘learning experience.’ Then again, I like to think of anything stupid I’ve done as a ‘learning experience.’ It makes me feel less stupid.

The world is being run by irresponsible spoiled brats.

New Hampshire polling data are unreliable because, when you call the Granite State’s registered Republicans and independents in the middle of dinner and ask them who they’re going to vote for, they have a mouth full of mashed potatoes and you can’t understand what they say.

The 20th century was a test bed for big ideas – fascism, communism, the atomic bomb.

Call a man ‘ignorant,’ and you have license to show the world your vast fund of knowledge and wise him up.

There isn’t much room for an outsider point of view in print any more.

The C student starts a restaurant. The A student writes restaurant reviews.

A U.S. dollar is an IOU from the Federal Reserve Bank. It’s a promissory note that doesn’t actually promise anything. It’s not backed by gold or silver.

I’m old enough to remember when the air over American cities was a lot dirtier than it is now.

When you’re a war correspondent, the reader is for you because the reader is saying, ‘Gee, I wouldn’t want to be doing that.’ They’re on your side.

When I’m in the car, I want the only one shouting to be me.

If you spend 72 hours in a place you’ve never been, talking to people whose language you don’t speak about social, political, and economic complexities you don’t understand, and you come back as the world’s biggest know-it-all, you’re a reporter. Either that or you’re President Obama.

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

People have to see it for what it is, but they would be so shocked to know two simple things that I just really never shared with anyone, but I spank my child at times.

It’s a great genre because you can do a lot. Sometimes in thrillers, you can really explore things, and it’s the same in this genre.

It was more disheartening, to be honest with you, just to kind of see how the National Football League really is.

So I feel like I’m really lucky to be alive in a time where there’s so much opportunity to disrupt and shake it up.

I’m really not vocal and expressive, but I’m starting to get more comfortable to open up.

I wasn’t really a big comic book guy, growing up. I watched cartoons, but the choices were a whole heck of a lot slimmer.

You really have to bring your game and know what you want to do.