Why do we have to be a military superpower? Why can't we be a humanitarian superpower?

Here's a president who gets 47 or 48 percent of the vote and takes 100 percent of the power, as if he had a mandate. He snuck into the presidency with the aid of political cronies, his father's having appointed members of the Supreme Court, his brother governor of Florida. And then he takes total control. And this is a president who seems to react to everything with force. Now we've had two wars. We've killed a lot of people. For anybody who is interested in not being a warlike nation anymore, and becoming a nation respected in the world, it becomes important to defeat Bush.

To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.

War is by definition the indiscriminate killing of huge numbers of people for ends that are uncertain. Think about means and ends, and apply it to war. The means are horrible, certainly. The ends, uncertain. That alone should make you hesitate. . . . We are smart in so many ways. Surely, we should be able to understand that in between war and passivity, there are a thousand possibilities.

But I suppose the most revolutionary act one can engage in is... to tell the truth.

In war, good guys always become bad guys.

That's generally true of people who drop bombs from high altitudes. You don't know what's going on below. You don't see the human consequences of what you're doing.