Verbatim

"Evidently this time He didn't listen to me."
POPE BENEDICT XVI, saying that he prayed to God that the conclave of Cardinals would not pick him as Pope

"Mr. Koizumi will go to Yasukuni this year again for sure. China accuses us because it doesn't understand the freedom of religion."
SHINZO ABE, acting Secretary-General of Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party, on Chinese anger over official visits to the controversial Yasukuni Shrine, which honors Japan's war dead, including 14 class-A war criminals

"I'm just here to say thank you, amen and go get 'em."
BILL CLINTON, former U.S. President, pledging his support for British Prime Minister Tony Blair's reelection campaign via satellite to a Labour Party gathering in London

"My sense of nationalism and Indonesian pride began to dominate, and I was prepared to defend myself against all the foreigners who were accosting me."
THEO TOEMION, chairman of Indonesia's Investment Coordinating Board, after he allegedly assaulted several parents and a 14-year-old referee over the "discriminatory" way in which the referee was treating his seven-year-old son during a basketball game at Jakarta International School

"Those were the two dumbest words I ever said."
GEORGE TENET, former CIA Director; on his assurance to U.S. President George W. Bush in 2002 that the cia had "slam dunk" evidence that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction

"I was not thinking when I signed the tax return."
DENNIS KOZLOWSKI, former Tyco CEO, taking the stand in his defense at his retrial on larceny and other charges, when asked why his 1999 tax return omitted a $25 million payment

"Everybody knows you always start with scissors."
ALICE MACLEAN, 12, advising her father, of Christie's, on strategy for rock, paper, scissors, the game a Japanese art collector used to decide which auction house should sell his $20 million collection