I believe in looking reality straight in the eye and denying it.

America of the future will be all malls connected by interstates. All because your parents no longer can their own tomatoes.

In California virtually everyone has had their teeth whitened. If they all smiled at once, they would give us a headache.

Nothing that readers say or do strikes me as a nuisance. Anyone who cracks open a book of mine is, to me, a gem.

This is Democratic bedrock: we don't let people lie in the ditch and drive past and pretend not to see them dying. Here on the frozen tundra of Minnesota, if your neighbor's car won't start, you put on your parka and get the jumper cables out and deliver the Sacred Spark that starts their car. Everybody knows this. The logical extension of this spirit is social welfare and the myriad government programs with long dry names all very uninteresting to you until you suddenly need one.

Humor is not a trick, not jokes. Humor is a presence in the world - like grace - and shines on everybody.

Anyone who thinks sitting in church can make you a Christian must also think that sitting in a garage can make you a car.