Verbatim: Nov. 14, 2005

"It's not easy to host all these countries. It's particularly not easy to host, perhaps, me." PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH, in a press conference in Mar del Plata, Argentina, site of the 34-nation Summit of the Americas, where anti-Bush protesters, calling him a "fascist" and a "terrorist," threw Molotov cocktails and set a building on fire

"This is an affront to me personally." BILL FRIST, Senate majority leader, on the Democrats' use of a rarely invoked rule that forced the Republican-controlled Senate into closed session--a move regarded by many as a publicity stunt--to discuss the stalled investigation into the Bush Administration's use of intelligence to justify the war in Iraq

"I submit to you that even today, as tough as things seem, it is much better to be us than them."

J. DENNIS HASTERT, G.O.P. Speaker of the House, during a closed-door meeting last week with Republicans, explaining that while President Bush's approval ratings are down, recent polls show no boost for Democrats

"They expect us to pay 75¢ on a dollar for flu medicine--that's going to be a tough pill to swallow." MIKE HUCKABEE, Arkansas Governor, on the White House's new $7.1 billion plan to prepare for a flu pandemic, which would require states to foot a big part of the bill for stockpiling antiflu drugs

"Tomlinson's resignation should be used to bring people together, not divide them as he and the Administration have done." DAVID OBEY, Representative of Wisconsin, who had called for an investigation into Kenneth Tomlinson, ousted last week as chairman of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting after the group's inspector general looked into allegations that he used questionable tactics to favor conservative political programming

"I'm saying maybe you put them on TV and cut off a thumb." OSCAR GOODMAN, Las Vegas mayor, in a televised interview, on how to stop graffiti artists from defacing the city's freeways

"They left me there, going through all that stress. They just let me rot." BOB DOUGHERTY, Home Depot customer in Boulder, Colo., on suing the company after store employees waited 15 minutes to respond to his cries for help--which they believed to be a hoax--in getting unstuck from a restroom toilet seat someone had smeared with glue

Sources: AFP; New York Times; Washington Post; AP (4)