* “It may turn out that Iraq will be the only country in the region with a representative government. But would I have recommended fighting for 10 years in order to achieve this? I would have said no.”–Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.
* “In response to all the rumors, I can testify that the president is recovering in a satisfactory manner.”–Adan Chavez on reports that his brother, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, is recovering from emergency (pelvic abscess) surgery in Cuba.
* “Jon Huntsman is making a point of being civil, saying, ‘I don’t think you need to run down somebody’s rep in order to run for the office of the president.’ To Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity, the shadow leadership of the GOP, such restraint smacks of wimpy accommodation–or treason.”–Margaret Carlson, Bloomberg News.
* “Apparently, I actually have to commit suicide to convince people I’m not running.”–New Jersey Republican Gov. Chris Christie.
* “Whereas Ron Paul criticizes U.S. interventionism in tropes familiar to the left–anti-imperial blowback, manipulation by neocons, moral equivalence–Rand Paul merely says America doesn’t have the money.”–Matt Continetti, The Weekly Standard.
* “When a church embraces a political party and becomes politicized, they lose their prophetic voice.”–Jo Anne Lyon, general superintendent of the Wesleyan Church, a member of the National Association of Evangelicals.
* “Drug policies here are more punitive and counterproductive than in other democracies and have brought about an explosion in prison populations. At the end of 1980, just before I left office, 500,000 people were incarcerated in America; at the end of 2009 the number was nearly 2.3 million. There are 743 people in prison for every 100,000 Americans, a higher portion than in any other country and seven times as great as in Europe.”–Former President Jimmy Carter.
* “History textbooks are badly written. So politically correct as to be comic.”–Historian David McCullough.
* “The U.S. armed forces knit together whites, blacks, Asians and Hispanics from diverse backgrounds, invests in their education and training, provides them with excellent health care and child care. And it does all this with minimal income gaps: A senior general earns about 10 times what a private makes, while, by my calculation, CEOs at major companies earn about 300 times as much as those cleaning their offices. That’s right: The military ethos can sound pretty lefty.”–Nicholas Kristof, New York Times.
* “There’s a difference between an economy not sprinting forward and one that’s going backward. This is an economy that’s walking forward instead of sprinting.”–Jeffrey Rubin, Birinyi Associates investment firm.
* “Let me be clear: Tax hikes are off the table.”–House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio.
* “Governors and presidents generally get too much credit and blame for job creation or losses.”–Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron.
* “How cool is it to be making history: the first Republican presidential campaign to be headquartered in Florida.”–GOP presidential candidate Jon Huntsman.
* “Renewable energy is a market that was shunned for a number of years. The general climate for renewable energy has changed.”–Jeff Adams, vice president of Tampa-based Griffin contracting and point man in the effort to build Pinellas County’s first major solar farm.
* “Downtowns are about density.”–Former Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio.
* “Diversity is always an issue in Tampa. We have a few tokens, but it’s not nearly the representation of the numbers in the community.”–Former Tampa Mayor Sandy Freedman.
* “The citizens don’t care that I’m a woman, and frankly they don’t care I’m a lesbian. They want their city to be safe.”–Tampa Police Chief Jane Castor.
* “Remove hockey from the equation. Had he chosen another business, he would be a phenomenal businessman there, too.”–Tampa Bay Lightning CEO Tod Leiweke commenting on Bolts’ general manager Steve Yzerman.