"Certain readers will read my book not because they are interested in Iraq, but because they read crime fiction. I did want to get beyond just speaking to other Middle East scholars, so I'm happy about that. But this was, nonetheless, a novel I wish I got to read in Arabic and translate."

“Art for me is like breathing.”

“The children of God have more in common then they have differences.”

“A bank is a place that will lend you money if you can prove that you don't need it.”

Source : Quoted in Alan Harrington, Life in the Crystal Palace (1959).

“To make a small town achieve its potential, you need everybody. When a blind person carries a crippled person who can see, both of them get where they're going.”

“America's experiment with government of the people, by the people, and for the people depends not only on constitutional structure and organization but also on the commitment, person to person, that we make to each other.”

“From my admittedly cranky perspective, Bush/Cheney are lousy on the Bill of Rights, Clinton/Gore were lousy on the Bill of Rights, and everyone within bribing distance of the 2008 election (Hillary, McCain, Giuliani) are lousy on the Bill of Rights, too.”

“Our greatest strength comes not from what we possess, but from what we believe; not from what we have, but from who we are.”

Source : Acceptance speech delivered to the Democratic Party's national convention, www.cnn.com. July 21, 1996.

“The minimum wage is mostly an entry-level wage for young people.”

Source : "Study: Most sponsors of minimum wage hike bill don't pay interns". www.foxnews.com. January 27, 2014.