So while I will never minimize the costs involved in military action, I am convinced that a failure to act in Libya would have carried a far greater price for America.

Our deeds determine us, as much as we determine our deeds.

Don’t let anybody make you think God chose America as His divine messianic force to be a sort of policeman of the whole world.

If you’re going to do something tonight that you’ll be sorry for tomorrow morning, sleep late.

I can not believe that war is the best solution. No one won the last war, and no one will win the next war.

America – a great social and economic experiment, noble in motive and far-reaching in purpose.

I say a murder is abstract. You pull the trigger and after that you do not understand anything that happens.

America will never seek a permission slip to defend the security of our people.

Today we did what we had to do. They counted on America to be passive. They counted wrong.

Ladies and gentlemen, god bless America – land of the free, home of the brave.

If atomic bombs are to be added as new weapons to the arsenals of a warring world, or to the arsenals of nations preparing for war, then the time will come when mankind will curse the names of Los Alamos and of Hiroshima.

One cannot violate the promptings of one’s nature without having that nature recoil upon itself.

In America, there might be better gastronomic destinations than New Orleans, but there is no place more uniquely wonderful.

Violence, even well intentioned, always rebounds upon oneself.

Al Qaeda is almost all in Pakistan, and Pakistan has nuclear weapons. And yet for every dollar we’re spending in Pakistan, we’re spending $30 in Afghanistan. Does that make strategic sense?

The 21st century is going to be the American century. Because we lead not only by the example of our power, but by the power of our example. That is the history of the journey of America.

America means far more than a continent bounded by two oceans. It is more than pride of military power, glory in war, or in victory. It means more than vast expanse of farms, of great factories or mines, magnificent cities, or millions of automobiles and radios.

There’s not a liberal America and a conservative America – there’s the United States of America.

I have only one yardstick by which I test every major problem – and that yardstick is: Is it good for America?

We have come to a turning point in the road. If we turn to the right mayhap our children and our children’s children will go that way; but if we turn to the left, generations yet unborn will curse our names for having been unfaithful to God and to His Word.

Fifty years of isolating Cuba had failed to promote democracy, setting us back in Latin America. That’s why we restored diplomatic relations, opened the door to travel and commerce, and positioned ourselves to improve the lives of the Cuban people.

The fact is, violence is not only not a beautiful thing, but it’s also very painful and not without consequences for the perpetrator as well as the victim.

The only definition by which America’s best days are behind it is on a purely relative basis.

A man is born alone and dies alone; and he experiences the good and bad consequences of his karma alone; and he goes alone to hell or the Supreme abode.

The effect of liberty to individuals is that they may do what they please: we ought to see what it will please them to do, before we risk congratulations.

I like America, just as everybody else does. I love America, I gotta say that. But America will be judged.

The United States is a violent military state. It’s been involved in military action all over the place.

And so I think that the idea of America working with other countries to solve problems is good for us, and it is part of digging us out of the ‚my way or the highway‘ approach that was evident in the previous eight years.

After the first blush of sin comes its indifference.

My heart aches for America and its deceived people.

Once the automobile appeared you could have predicted that it would destroy as many people as it did.

Are we simply waving farewell to the days when some of the most interesting thinking in Europe and America came to us from our fiction film-makers? BBC2, which once introduced and showed great films, now shows none.

When you have to make a choice and don’t make it, that is in itself a choice.

Laughter is America’s most important export.

As the eagle was killed by the arrow winged with his own feather, so the hand of the world is wounded by its own skill.

America… just a nation of two hundred million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns and no qualms about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable.

Never envy a man his lady. Behind it all lays a living hell.

I love America more than any other country in this world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.

There are risks and costs to action. But they are far less than the long range risks of comfortable inaction.

Unfortunately, after Sept. 11, there was an outburst in America of intense suffering and patriotism, and the Bush administration was very shrewd and effective in painting anyone who disagreed with the policies as unpatriotic or even traitorous.

I saw what happened when a dictator was allowed to take over a piece of a country and the country went down the tubes. And I saw the opposite during the war when America joined the fight.

Since I have come to America, I am often asked whether my next novel will be set in America. I don’t think it will. I think I will be living in America for some time to come, but while living in America, I would like to write about Japanese society from the outside.

In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing.

I’ve said many a time that I think the Un-American Activities Committee in the House of Representatives was the most un-American thing in America!

The men who have guided the destiny of the United States have found the strength for their tasks by going to their knees. This private unity of public men and their God is an enduring source of reassurance for the people of America.

I came here in 1974 to do a play, and then I went to L.A. I really like living in America. I feel more at home here than anywhere else.

How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds makes ill deeds done!

I think life is a matter of choices and that wherever we are, good or bad, is because of choices we make.

I will never relent in defending America – whatever it takes.

I didn’t mean to hit the umpire with the dirt, but I did mean to hit that bastard in the stands.

I grew up in San Francisco. And so I’m informed in a certain kind of way about, you know, believing in democracy and believing in America. And I’m a very ardent patriot.

You may agree or not with Gaddafi’s political ideas, but no one has the right to question the existence of Libya as an independent state and member of the United Nations.

I have one yardstick by which I test every major problem – and that yardstick is: Is it good for America?

No memory of having starred atones for later disregard, or keeps the end from being hard.

I see Libya as a member of the Non-Aligned Movement and a sovereign State of the nearly 200 members of the United Nations.

Everything I have, my career, my success, my family, I owe to America.

To make America the greatest is my goal, so I beat the Russian and I beat the Pole. And for the U.S.A. won the medal of gold. The Greeks said, ‚You’re better than the Cassius of old.‘

I bought a gun and chose drugs instead.

The more people smoke herb, the more Babylon fall.

We’ve protected thousands of people in Libya; we have not seen a single U.S. casualty; there’s no risks of additional escalation. This operation is limited in time and in scope.

When rich people fight wars with one another, poor people are the ones to die.