I wrote the show West Wing for the two years before and the two years after 9/11. Suddenly everyone in the world had been through something that our characters had not been through; the whole trajectory of the world had changed. Yet our show took place in a parallel universe. I wasn't really sure what to do about this. In no one's wildest dreams did it occur that an event like this could possibly happen.

That's a very real feeling - that I don't have a story to tell. I'm not a pure storyteller. I have a tough time with story.

Government should be a place where people can come together, and no one gets left behind. No one…gets left behind. An instrument of good.

When I was a kid, I wanted to be an actor. I was acting in all the school plays. I went to school for acting. I was really sure that that's what I wanted to do.

It wouldn't kill you to watch a film or pick up a newspaper once in a while.

Good writers borrow from other writers. Great writers steal from them outright.

Never argue with a drunk or a fool.