Jim Lehrer Quotes

I wanted to be a bus driver when I was a kid. I look at bus driving through the eyes of a little boy. I see it as glamorous.

The shouting and opinion and jokes don't exist if there isn't first a story.

I'm in the civil discourse business. I think it takes all kinds. And more power to everybody.

I'm a gatekeeper, and the gatekeepers all used to be mostly old, white men.

There's only one interview technique that matters... Do your homework so you can listen to the answers and react to them and ask follow-ups. Do your homework, prepare.

Best I can do for them is to give them every piece of information I can find and let them make the judgments. That's just my basic view of my function as a journalist.

You want to see an angry person? Let me hear a cell phone go off.

As I say, I'm a discourse advocate. What form it comes is less important to me than the fact that there is discourse.

I'm an expert on the NewsHour and it isn't how I practice journalism. I am not involved in the story. I serve only as a reporter or someone asking questions. I am not the story.

I believe an invitation from the Commission on Presidential Debates is similar to a draft notice - a civic responsibility.

I came from a family of Marines into the family of Marines.

If people want bells and whistles and all of that, there are bells and whistles available. If they don't want bells and whistles there are places to go where they are not available.

My own view, there is a need for and a demonstrated need for more journalism now than there ever has been.

There's always a germ of truth in just about everything.

We have increasingly fewer and fewer journalists who have any military experience and understand what life is like in the military and in combat.

The death rate among Marines in Iraq has been more than double that of the other services.

I have great faith in the intelligence of the American viewer and reader to put two and two together and come up with four.

In my case, I was covering politics in Texas as a newspaper man in the 1960's.

I always wear blue shirts and I like wine or purple ties.

If you go to the ball game, you don't need to read the game story.

My writing is extremely important, so I write every day. I just enjoy it. I get a kick out of it.

In television there are only about 12 people who do what I do.

On a daily basis there are some huge ones that are, sure, from time to time, but it is helping the reader sort through all this sort of gray stuff out there.

Those who know me know I won't hesitate to turn around and point someone out.

I'm not in the being-annoyed business.

A debate has one purpose, one purpose only, and that is to facilitate the exchange of ideas directly between two candidates, and that's it.

I have no reason to lie and every reason not to. If I do lie, I will be prosecuted.

Let me be clear: Despite Roger Clemens' statements to the contrary, I never injected Roger Clemens, or anyone else, with lidocaine or B-12.

Make no mistake: When I told Senator Mitchell that I injected Roger Clemens with performance-enhancing drugs, I told the truth.

I'm not saying Senator Mitchell's report is entirely wrong. I am saying Brian McNamee's statements about me are wrong. Let me be clear: I have never taken steroids or HGH.

My Marine experience helped shape who I am now personally and professionally, and I am grateful for that on an almost daily basis.

The best nourishment for any soul is to create your own risks.

I'm a journalist and that's what I do.

I'm not in the judgment part of journalism.

If we're going to have debates, let's have real debates.

Well, to tell you truth, I have learned a long time ago that the trick when doing a debate, any kind of debate, is to just turn off the judgment switch in my head.

A skill required to be president is to explain to the American people any given thing they do.

Most of the gaffes I've made have not been funny - they've been stupid.

I'm in the reporting part of journalism.

There are very few really stark black and white stories.

No two people see things the same way.

Most of the stories I have covered in 45 years have been gray stories.

People can say anything they want to. If they don't want to get the news from me, get it from somebody else. It's not something I'm going to worry about, I'm sorry.

Journalism is caring where the fire-engines are going.