Verbatim: Feb. 6, 2006

"He's an honorable man who loves his country and loves his Constitution. Can we really ask for more?" ROBERT BYRD, Democratic Senator from West Virginia, on his support for the confirmation of Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court

"Anyone with an ounce of sense would see it exactly opposite." DONALD RUMSFELD, Defense Secretary, responding to reports, including one from the Pentagon, that the U.S. military--ground forces in Iraq in particular--is overstretched

"The forces are stretched ... I don't think there's any question of that." GENERAL GEORGE CASEY, commander of the multinational forces in Iraq, the day after Rumsfeld's comment

"The Palestinians gave their vote to the party that gave its blood." AYYOUB MUHANNA, Lebanese shop owner, celebrating the militant group Hamas' surprise landslide victory in the Palestinian parliamentary elections

"It's really very hard to tell people to think at work but not at home." CONDOLEEZZA RICE, Secretary of State, calling on China to expand its citizens' civil liberties

"God sent me 1,000 hints that he didn't want me to keep doing what I was doing. But I didn't listen, so he set off a nuclear bomb." JACK ABRAMOFF, disgraced lobbyist, talking to a Jewish publication about his crimes and the scandal that has hit Capitol Hill

"It makes our job considerably easier when they advertise and let us know where to get ahold of them." MAJOR PATRICK KITCHENS, of the Leavenworth, Kans., police department, after the arrest of alleged crack dealer Sylvester J. Williams, whose business cards read, FOR A QUICK HIT ON TIME CALL THE BOSS

"I would stand in the door and not let this go out if we were going to take away that joy." STAN OSMAN, marketing executive for Interstate Bakeries, promising that the new whole-wheat Wonder bread will have the original's famed ability to be balled up and lobbed across school cafeterias

Sources: New York Times; Department of Defense; AP; Los Angeles Times; AFP; Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles; AP (2)