The press always wants to know how many people will be killed or how much it will cost, but the answers to those questions are not knowable.

Reduce the number of lawyers. They are like beavers - they get in the middle of the stream and dam it up.

The Secretary of Defense is not a super General or Admiral. His task is to exercise civilian control over the Department for the Commander-in-Chief and the country.

Don't necessarily avoid sharp edges. Occasionally they are necessary to leadership.

Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction.

We know where they are. They are in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad.

We know where they are [Iraq's weapons of mass destruction]. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat.

We do know of certain knowledge that he [Osama Bin Laden] is either in Afghanistan, or in some other country, or dead.

Be precise. A lack of precision is dangerous when the margin of error is small.

If you are not criticized, you may not be doing much.

Look for what's missing. Many advisors can tell a President how to improve what's proposed or what's gone amiss. Few are able to see what isn't there.

Later, when you're grown up, you realize you never really get to hang out with your family. You pretty much have only eighteen years to spend with them full time, and that's it.

Sympathy is the charm of human life.

You can have no oath registered in heaven to destroy the Government while I shall have the most solemn one to "preserve protect and defend" it.

The problem with me, as far as getting married and having a family, is that my comedy is so important to me. So I don't know if I'll ever be as good a dad as my dad.

I can't die but once.

I'm like everybody else: weak, full of mistakes, but basically good.

I have a lot of cooking tools. In fact I have a whole drawer full of knives. Cooking tools, especially cutlery, are my toys.

I have nine children... and one of them is an invalid. Her mother is obliged to take her away in the winter, and when one bird is off the nest, the other has to go on.

[Ronald Reagan] called the image of [George] Washington praying on his knees in Valley Forge "the most sublime image in American history."

Actors are players and if they're hot, or onto something, you let them go, or you and the actor can both get on to something. I always run out with lines as I think of them.