If you watch cooking shows on cable, they have lots of British people. Because when you think good cooking, you immediately think Britain.

I used to believe, like many people who come from poor backgrounds, that it gave me an edge, but I think that's just something we have to tell ourselves to get by sometimes. I don't believe that anymore. Children of privilege can be just as talented and clever as anybody else.

During the cold war, West Berlin was an exclave - a tiny outpost of liberalism surrounded by people who want to crush it. It was like Austin, Texas.

These days, teachers have it rough. Kids can be hyperactive, disobedient, and obnoxious. It must feel like being locked in a room of drunk midgets.

I didn't flee a dictator or swim an ocean to be an American like some do. I just thought long and hard about it.

I had lived in fear of the fabled terrifying visions that assail chronic drinkers, but which had not yet attacked me.

I'm a terrible interviewer. I'm not a journalist - although I have a Peabody Award - and I'm not really a late-night host. What I am is honest.