There is no more dangerous thing for a democracy than a foreign policy based on presidential preventive war.

Honest history is the weapon of freedom.

The first rule of democracy is to distrust all leaders who begin to believe their own publicity.

Clarity in language depends on clarity in thought.

The basic human rights documents-the American Declaration of Independence and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man-were written by political, not by religious, leaders.

What we need is a rebirth of satire, of dissent, of irreverence, of an uncompromising insistence that phoniness is phony and platitudes are platitudinous.

History is, indeed, an argument without end.

The genius of impeachment lay in the fact that it could punish the man without punishing the office.

Those who are convinced they have a monopoly on The Truth always feel that they are only saving the world when they slaughter the heretics.

For most Americans the Constitution had become a hazy document, cited like the Bible on ceremonial occasions but forgotten in the daily transactions of life.

Anti-intellectualism has long been the anti-Semitism of the businessman.

Everywhere I go, there are all these Big Star freaks, and they’re nice little guys who are usually in college, and they’re kind of lonely and misunderstood, learning to play guitar.

Be bold. If you're going to make an error, make a doozy, and don't be afraid to hit the ball.

I've managed to make a living in a very ridiculous business, and that's fine with me. The trick now is, after you've been in it for a while, you still have to remember to have fun.

In my world there's no room for hate or discrimination in the White House. I will be an outspoken voice against that every time.

I haven't hit the bestseller list, but I consider myself one of the luckiest writers in the world, and this is mainly because of Grub Street.

If this Punic war was carried on without any effusion of blood, it was owing much less to the moderation than to the weakness of the contending prelates.

Doctors always think anybody doing something they aren't is a quack; also they think all patients are idiots.

Foppery is never cured; it is the bad stamina of the mind, which, like those of the body, are never rectified; once a coxcomb always a coxcomb.

Justice Ginsburg is a very competent justice, and it is a joy to have her on the court, but particularly for me it is a pleasure to have a second woman on the court.

Journalism has a special, hallowed place for stories of its practitioners' persecution.