'We are still driving on the same winding mountain road, but this time in a faster car.'
NEIL BAROFSKY, special inspector general for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, arguing in a report to Congress that the issues that led to the 2008 financial crisis remain unaddressed
'Presidents get swollen heads.'
SAYED HABIB SADAT, Afghan hatmaker, on President Hamid Karzai's signature karakul hat, whose measurements have increased an inch since Karzai took office
'I would make a fair bet that I would have said no to such an offer, or I would have charged him some incredible amount of money.'
DAVE MATTHEWS, musician, responding to rumors that disgraced presidential contender John Edwards had once talked with his mistress Rielle Hunter about getting the singer's band to play at their wedding
'This isn't about a lie, or a conspiracy, or a deceit, or a deception. It's a decision.'
TONY BLAIR, former British Prime Minister, on his choice to go to war in Iraq alongside the U.S. in order to oust Saddam Hussein
'We've already been to the moon.'
BUZZ ALDRIN, one of the original Apollo 11 astronauts, supporting the Obama Administration's plan to scrap NASA's Constellation program--intended to put American explorers back on the moon--in favor of smaller projects
'Rich people spend a lot more money on their own problems, like baldness, than they do to fight malaria.'
BILL GATES, criticizing Italy's low levels of foreign aid in 2009--which had fallen by half from the year before--and blaming Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who is rumored to have undergone hair transplants
'It's always better to leave the party early.'
BILL WATTERSON, reclusive creator of the popular comic strip Calvin and Hobbes, explaining in his first interview since 1989 why he stopped drawing the strip at the height of its popularity
TALKING HEADS
Thomas Friedman
Calling for political compromise, in the New York Times:
"If there were just six or eight Republican senators--a few more Judd Greggs and Lindsey Grahams--ready to meet Obama somewhere in the middle ... I believe that in the wake of the Massachusetts wake-up call the president would indeed meet them in that middle ground to forge not just incremental compromises, but substantial ones ... But so far, the Republicans are having a good year politically by just being the Party of No."
--1/30/10
Laurie Essig
On filmmaker James O'Keefe's alleged attempt to tap the phones of a U.S. Senator, on TrueSlant.com
"Although I support O'Keefe's right ... to throw metaphorical and even actual pies in the faces of his enemies, I must draw the line ... at breaking and entering under false pretenses. There is nothing wrong with standing up in public space and screaming, 'Look, the Emperor has no clothes.' There is something sleazy about sneaking into the Emperor's closet with a hidden camera."
--1/31/10
Jonah Goldberg
In USA Today, on things the President can't control--and things he can: