ALAN K. SIMPSON

An educated man is thoroughly inoculated against humbug, thinks for himself and tries to give his thoughts, in speech or on paper, some style.

He's a million rubber bands in his resilience.

If you have integrity, nothing else matters. If you don't have integrity, nothing else matters.

Reagan didn't put anything off the table, if he felt it was for the good of the American people to tweak the tax system.

I consider abortion to be a deeply personal and intimate issue for women and I don't believe male legislators should even vote on the issue.

If you're in the game long enough, you're going to be the toast of the town one day, and the next day you'll be toast.

The word liberal distinguishes whatever nourishes the mind and spirit from the training which is merely practical or professional or from the trivialities which are no training at all.

You were doing a sadistic little disservice to your country.

He has to do the heavy lifting and the windows and the wash, and also protect the president.

Any education that matters is liberal. All the saving truths, all the healing graces that distinguish a good education from a bad one or a full education from a half empty one are contained in that word.

Legislating should be done in a manner that is understandable to the governed.

A zealot is a person who, having forgotten his original purpose, redoubles his efforts.

It’s all in there. We have harpooned every whale in the ocean.

… rigid and homophobic

As a lifelong Republican who served in the Army in Germany, I believe it is critical that we review — and overturn — the ban on gay service in the military. I voted for "don't ask, don't tell." But much has changed since 1993. My thinking shifted when I read that the military was firing translators because they are gay. According to the Government Accountability Office, more than 300 language experts have been fired under "don't ask, don't tell," including more than 50 who are fluent in Arabic. This when even Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice recently acknowledged the nation's "foreign language deficit" and how much our government needs Farsi and Arabic speakers. Is there a "straight" way to translate Arabic? Is there a "gay" Farsi? My God, we'd better start talking sense before it is too late. We need every able-bodied, smart patriot to help us win this war.

There is no "slippery slope" toward loss of liberty, only a long staircase where each step down must first be tolerated by the American people and their leaders.

If you can’t learn to compromise an issue without compromising yourself then you better not be a legislator and you better not marry.

Erskine Bowles and I know that we have been successful with this commission because we have pissed off almost everyone in America.

Republicans have the habit of giving their possible presidential candidates a saliva test for purity, and then bitching for 4 years because they lost the last election..

Now it’s just sharp elbows, and instead of having a caucus where you sit down and say, ‘What are you doing for your country?’ you sit figuring out how to screw the other side.

We found enough fat in the Defense Department to send a truck of potato chips to the obese.

Hatred corrodes the container it’s carried in.

The AARP is a group of 3.8 million Americans bound together by a common love of airline discounts and insurance discounts.

As a lifelong Republican who served in the Army in Germany, I believe it is critical that we review - and overturn - the ban on gay service in the military. I voted for 'don't ask, don't tell.' But much has changed since 1993. My thinking shifted when I read that the military was firing translators because they are gay.

Without the confidence to know our democracy is functioning properly, we risk more disillusionment, more cynicism, and even more public apathy toward the entire system.