I doubt that Congress would pass on the opportunity to make sure that our children were safe from terrorists.

Collecting intelligence information is like trying to drink water out of a fire hydrant. You know, in hindsight It's great. The problem is there's a million dots at the time.

My role and my obligation was to conduct criminal investigations.

The American people must be willing to give up a degree of personal privacy in exchange for safety and security.

Ask the American public if they want an FBI wiretap and they'll say, "no." If you ask them do they want a feature on their phone that helps the FBI find their missing child they'll say, "Yes."

I was a prosecutor and an FBI agent for many, many years.

The fraudster's greatest liability is the certainty that the fraud is too clever to be detected.

And I understand that, I testified in closed hearings over eight years because there are intelligence matters, there are sensitive matters that should not be held in a public hearing.

The State Department said the countries that are most stealing our best ideas also are our best allies.

I wanted all my visits to be official. When I sent the pass back with a note, I had no idea it would antagonize the president. I found out years later that it did.

The country was not focused on terrorism before September 11th.

Knowing is not enough, we must apply. Willing is not enough, we must do.

Alcohol has its own well-know defects as a medication for depression but no one has ever suggested - ask any doctor - that it is not the most effective anti-anxiety agent yet known.

I feel that music is more flexible than language and your song, or "piece" is only as flexible as your least flexible component.

Longing alone is singer to the lute.

I'll take lying in your arms tonight over and above any love I've known. Memories may find me, but they'll always be behind me. I'll take today over yesterday, anyday.

Of all my books, I find only a few indispensible.

Infancy conforms to nobody; all conform to it.

There is no way that we can predict the weather six months ahead beyond giving the seasonal average.

In all things there is a kind of law of cycles. [Lat., Rebus cunctis inest quidam velut orbis.]

I mean, you may be very mad at some guy that walked away with a huge golden parachute, but that really isn't the important thing.