"The hoary joke in the literary world, based on 'Dreams From My Father,' was that if things had worked out differently for Barack Obama, he could have made it as a writer."

"For a decade or more after the Vietnam war, the people who had guided the U.S. to disaster decently shrank from the public stage."

"For the record, I am sticking with my claim that the simultaneous degradation of air quality, water quality, water supply, food safety, soil quality, and other environment-related variables is the main challenge to China's continued development."

"I seem to be one of the few people in journalism who never worked or wrote for the 'Boston Phoenix.' I certainly read and admired it, and feel the same general malaise at news that it is gone."

"Spiritually good people, pure in heart, who long for the Blessed Sacrament but cannot receive at the time, can receive spiritually... even a hundred times a day, in sickness and in health, with immeasurable grace and profit."

"If you're not a real chameleon of an actor and if you're not one of those guys who can really shape-change themselves all the time, one of the ways to keep pushing yourself and keep changing is to be in different kinds of movies."

"I've had an exciting time I married for love and got a little money along with it."

"I'm not interested in trying to work on people's perceptions. I am who I am, and if you don't take the time to learn about that, then your perception is going to be your problem."