You can't beat your enemy anymore through wars; instead you create an entire generation of people revenge-seeking. [...] Our opponents are going to resort to car bombs and suicide attacks because they have no other way to win. I believe (Rumsfeld) thinks this is a war that can be won, but there is no such thing anymore. We can't beat anyone anymore.

Peace is a fulltime job. It's protecting civilians, overseeing elections, and disarming ex-combatants. Peace, like war, must be waged.

What you learn after you are 40 is that it is just about plugging up holes in the boat. You just hope you have enough corks to plug enough of the holes.

Whatever you do, don’t wake up at 65 years old and think about what you should have done with your life.

As a director, I do very few takes, because I feel like you hire the right actor and they'll do the job right. And the directors that I've worked with and had the best luck with - Jason and [ Steven] Soderbergh and the Coen brothers - all have been that kind of director.

There's a certain cruelty to being on a big screen as your eyelids start to sag and your hair falls out and turns gray that you either have to be able to handle or not. What you can't do is try to force yourself into roles that you could have played or would have played ten years earlier.

I have a real interest in pushing some of the limits of things that studios don't want to make.