A particular moment - and I'm not, to this day, quite sure how I feel about it - I had always wanted to be in the law books - you know, Hentoff vs. something or other.

I always wanted to be a lawyer,but I certainly never wanted to be a trapeze performer.

There is a seamless web to life.. all life is sacred.

I think Obama is possibly the most dangerous and destructive president we have ever had

A lot of people in the adult population have a very limited idea as to why they are Americans, why we have a First Amendment or a Bill of Rights.

Do not categorize about music. You take each musician at the time and open yourself to that musician.

I was introduced to jazz, and that's become a basic concern and passion of mine ever since.

My parents were Orthodox Jews but not very regular Orthodox Jews. I was bar mitzvahed and all that. But God was hardly ever mentioned in my family. Franklin D. Roosevelt was.

The media ignores what is really going on.

I would bet there is no place in the United States where the First Amendment would survive intact.

What we have now in America is a surveillance society.

[Chess] is a foolish expedient for making idle people believe they are doing something very clever, when they are only wasting their time.

Without love, life has no meaning.

She is a woman, how can you confuse her for a man?

Tell me what's the difference

We learn that those around us are an extension of ourselves, both animate and inanimate. All things have a life and form. We learn to love them all.

I guess I just have bigger ovaries.

Temperament is the primary requisite for the critic - a temperament exquisitely susceptible to beauty, and to the various impressions that beauty gives us.

Boredom between two people doesn't come from being together physically. It comes from being apart mentally and spiritually.

I think most of us are raised with preconceived notions of the choices we're supposed to make.

What's important is not the accolades and memories of success but the way you respond when opportunities are denied.