BOB KERREY

There is no force more liberating than the knowledge that you are fighting for others.

If you look beyond the short term violence and instability, you do see significant activities on the part of the Iraqi people that indicate they understand the commitment necessary to govern themselves. It's not clear how they will do it, but it never is.

I've been a Yankees fan since I was six.

The idea that somebody who has done something horrible in a war is not willing to talk about it for 32 years is hardly a shocking idea. Quite the contrary.

The only medal that I am certain I deserved is the Purple Heart.

Cuba wants to get rid of a dictator, and baseball needs a dictator.

Like Jonah, the whale had swallowed me; unlike him, I believed I would spend eternity inside the belly of the beast.

I value public service and I'm relatively good at organizing political causes.

The problem is you tend to look back and identify mistakes, and as a consequence of feeling terrible about mistakes you say you bungled this so bad, let's get out of here.

It's not clear in the U.S. at the moment, either. We're going through another election.

But on the big things, I'm not going to trim in order to win public opinion. Because I really don't want to serve in the Senate if I arrive there without permission to do the things I think need to be done.

When you're fighting for economic and social justice, you're always fighting for the minority.

Historians in the future will surely wonder what went so wrong when the United States, for the first time ever, focused its foreign policy on the Islamic world.

Health care is the Pac-Man of the budget.

I will not be doing Super-Pacs of any sort. I think allowing unlimited contributions to campaigns is a terrible and an unfortunate step towards plutocracy.

Marijuana can be a highly effective treatment for PTSD, a condition afflicting nearly one in five veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And overwhelming scientific evidence has already proven marijuana's safety and efficacy for treating conditions like chronic pain, which affects many combat-injured veterans... Veterans in states without medical marijuana laws fare far worse. These veterans risk arrest for using marijuana to treat their combat injuries, joining the more than 800,000 Americans arrested annually for marijuana offenses... They deserve to receive medical advice from their VA doctors, not the DEA.”

Our democracy will survive the hostility of Vladimir Putin. What it may not survive is distrust of our system of justice.

A hero is someone who over and over does the right thing even though no one is there to witness it.

Unexpected kindness is the most powerful, least costly, and most underrated agent of human change. Kindness that catches us by surprise brings out the best in our natures.

I thought dying for your country was the worst thing that could happen to you. I think killing for your country can be a lot worse. Because that's the memory that haunts.

Clinton's an unusually good liar. Unusually Good. Do you realize that?

The cheapest gift I have to give is kindness, and it is the best.