Imprisonment has become the response of first resort to far too many of our social problems.

I'm no longer accepting the things I cannot change...I'm changing the things I cannot accept.

You have to act as if it were possible to radically transform the world. And you have to do it all the time.

We live in a society of an imposed forgetfulness, a society that depends on public amnesia.

When children attend schools that place a greater value on discipline and security than on knowledge and intellectual development, they are attending prep schools for prison.

Walls turned sideways are bridges.

Justice is indivisible. You can't decide who gets civil rights and who doesn't.

We must always attempt to lift as we climb

The idea of freedom is inspiring. But what does it mean? If you are free in a political sense but have no food, what's that? The freedom to starve?

We have to talk about liberating minds as well as liberating society.

I have a hard time accepting diversity as a synonym for justice. Diversity is a corporate strategy.

Beauty may catch the eye, but a jolly laugh will lasso the heart.

Autumn is as joyful and sweet as an untimely end.

We are sometimes tempted to believe the lie that God does not love us. Thankfully the Bible is filled with evidence that this is not true.

I believe in open government. I've always believed in open government. I don't e-mail, however. And there's a reason: I don't want you reading my personal stuff.

If you have the choice, it's far better to say, "That person has the job, and they really don't need that much of my oversight." Maybe they don't need any of it.

Being famous as a writer is like being famous in a village. It's not really any very heady fame.

I remember the snow in Canada and the lovely weather in New Zealand. And I slightly remember going to school there.

It's not that marriage itself is bad; it's the people we marry who give it a bad name.

Hitler had this understanding that you speak to people's deepest, darkest emotions and give them voice that can be incredibly effective.