Whenever there is news of a terrible shooting, I wonder why America has so miserably failed to enact even common-sense gun legislation.

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.

Read books. Care about things. Get excited. Try not to be too down on youself. Enjoy the ever present game of knowing.

We fear that we are ugly, that we cannot succeed and we are afraid of something

Girl listens to radio. Girl finds music. Girl has whole other world.Girl slips on headphones. World gone.

Resolve to be thyself and know that he who finds himself loses his misery.

Somehow, we each create our own prisons, one for which only we, hold the key.

I wrote six pilots, none of which ever got picked up. When you stop trying, it then it falls in your lap.

I just keep thinking how lucky I am that I haven't had to sacrifice anything.

I mean, I must confess I don't own Harry Potter DVDs. My parents do. They have them all. And they like watching them.

I had a wonderful childhood, but I was a wanderer from year one.

If our expectations, if our fondest prayers and dreams, are not realized then we should all bear in mind that the greatest glory of living lies not in never falling but in rising every time you fall.