We know of no spectacle more ridiculous—or more contemptible—than that of the religious reactionaries who dare to re-write the history of our republic. Or who try to do so. Is it possible that, in their vanity and stupidity, they suppose that they can erase the name of Thomas Jefferson and replace it with the name of some faith-based mediocrity whose name is already obscure? If so, we cheerfully resolve to mock them, and to give them the lie in their teeth.

I have decided to take whatever my disease can throw at me.

If the Qur'an was the word of God, it had been dictated on a very bad day.

The human wish to credit good things as miraculous and to charge bad things to another account is apparently universal.

The one thing that the racist can never manage is anything like discrimination: he is indiscriminate by definition.

I can't compose or play music; I'm not that fortunate. But I can write and I can talk and sometimes when I'm doing either of these things I realize that I've written a sentence or uttered a thought that I didn't absolutely know I had in me... until I saw it on the page or heard myself say it.

History is a tragegy, not a morality tale.