Americans don't want leadership. They want alchemy.

So the danger of conservative judicial activism has been averted for another year. Stay tuned.

Of course, conservatives always claim to be against judicial activism.

The takings clause of the Fifth Amendment is for conservatives what the equal protection clause of the 14th is for liberals.

Many 'hard' scientists regard the term 'social science' as an oxymoron. Science means hypotheses you can test, and prove or disprove. Social science is little more than observation putting on airs.

In those days, the late 1970s, one of the leading politicians was a soon-to-be uncle by marriage of Arnold Schwarzenegger, named Ted Kennedy.

He's nice enough not to want to be associated with a nasty remark but not nice enough not to make it. Lacking the courage of one's nastiness does not make one nice.

Anything that keeps a politician humble is healthy for democracy.

If sexual intercourse, as the poets tell us, began in 1963, it was another decade and a half before the American political system began to take notice.

If hypocrisy is the tribute vice pays to virtue, piousness is virtue paying tribute to itself.

I have a saying: the scandal isn't what's illegal, the scandal is what's legal.

Katie, when I saw you again, there was nothing I wanted to do more than stand by your side for the rest of my life.

Illusion is the first of all pleasures.

When you live on cash, you understand the limits of the world around which you navigate each day. Credit leads into a desert with invisible boundaries.

The difference between a friend and an acquaintance is that a friend helps; an acquaintance merely advises.

What makes a specific quality or quantity of innovation retain its intense newness over the years?

Writing eases my suffering . . . writing is my way of reaffirming my own existence.

Golf is like hunting and fishing. What counts is the companionship and fellowship of friends, not what you catch or shoot.

The American people probably aren't going to fall in love with Mitt Romney.

Hinduism with its message of ahimsa is to me the most glorious religion in the world.

So very difficult a matter is it to trace and find out the truth of anything by history.