Verbatim: Feb. 26, 2007

"If I was running al-Qaeda in Iraq, I would put a circle around March 2008 and pray, as many times as possible, for a victory not only for Obama but also for the Democrats." JOHN HOWARD, Australian Prime Minister and George W. Bush ally, on presidential hopeful Barack Obama--a staunch Iraq-war critic who said he would remove troops by March 2008

"So if he is ginned up to fight the good fight in Iraq, I would suggest that he calls up another 20,000 Australians and sends them to Iraq." BARACK OBAMA, in response

"One cold war was quite enough." ROBERT GATES, Secretary of Defense, reacting to comments by Russian President Vladimir Putin, who blamed U.S. policy for forcing other countries to seek nuclear weapons to defend themselves

"We don't know what those other cycles were caused by in the past. It could be dinosaur flatulence. Who knows?" REPRESENTATIVE DANA ROHRABACHER, a Republican global-warming skeptic, during a congressional hearing on the climate-change report, which concluded for the first time that evidence linking human behavior to rising global temperatures was "unequivocal"

"I think I kind of represent all Bears fans. Not that I'm saying they're all idiots like me, but I represent their passion because I really care about my team, you know?" SCOTT WIESE, a Chicago Bears fanatic who will legally change his name to Peyton Manning, the same as the Indianapolis Colts quarterback's, after losing a bet

Sources: Age (Australia); Reuters; AP; Knight Ridder Washington Bureau; AP

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