The more we can do to support and promulgate the intellectual traditions of the Abrahamic faiths - of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam - the better armed we will be to fight fundamentalism.

We often talk too much & listen too little. The surer route to winning a friend isn't to convince them that you're right, but that you care what they think.

Our greatest leaders are neither dreamers nor dictators: They are, like Jefferson, those who articulate national aspirations yet master the mechanics of influence and know when to depart from dogma.

[T]o argue that something is so because it is in the Bible is more than intellectually bankrupt.

A lot of people, including business leaders, think the future belongs to China. Globalization is not a zero-sum game, but we need to hone our skills to stay in play.

Religious belief, like history itself, is a story that is always unfolding, always subject to inquiry and ripe for questioning. For without doubt there is no faith.

The Occupy Wall Street protests at last suggest that America's wealth gap is once again becoming an organizing political principle in the country.

Liberty is precious. But so is life. It should not be so difficult for men and women of good will and good heart and sound mind to find the right balance between the two.

In the fullness of time, I suspect that bigotry against homosexuals will seem as repugnant as racial prejudice does today. Or so one hopes.

No government can be maintained without the principle of fear as well as duty.

Jefferson was the rare leader who stood out from the crowd without intimidating it.

She wished for a moment that they were all children again. It still seemed extraordinary to her, that everything had turned out the way it had.

President Obama and his successors are dependent on the 100, 000-plus people inside the American intelligence community - the people Edward Snowden betrayed.

Like love, breakfast is best when made at home.

Me can't be prejudice. Me can't me no think of life that way. Because, me figure if you prejudice, that mean you have a hate. If you have a hate inside of you, you can't be righteous.

I didn't actually figure out how to get guidance, so I just decided to go to school at University of Southern California because they sent me a glossy brochure.

It's too easy to give up on the things that are hard to accomplish.

I paint the ocean - I think of its vastness - its power - its wetness.

But Tommy Lee Jones is just smooth. He's just the real deal. I'm captivated by him because there's so little of that in Hollywood, and he just embodies it.

In the middle of the night, if you have decided to do something good for the world, don't wait for the morning to come!

Most investors would be better off in an index fund.