Good ideas are not adopted automatically. They must be driven into practice with courageous impatience. Once implemented they can be easily overturned or subverted through apathy or lack of follow-up, so a continuous effort is required.

When doing a job — any job — one must feel that he owns it, and act as though he will remain in that job forever.

It troubles me that we are so easily pressured by purveyors of technology into permitting so-called "progress" to alter our lives without attempting to control it-as if technology were an irrepressible force of nature to which we must meekly submit.

Trying to make things work in government is sometimes like trying to sew a button on a custard pie.

If you are going to sin, sin against God, not the bureaucracy. God will forgive you but the bureaucracy won't.

I do not have regrets. I believe I helped preserve the peace for this country. Why should I regret that? What I accomplished was approved by Congress -- which represents our people. All of you live in safety from domestic enemies because of security from the police. Likewise, you live in safety from foreign enemies because our military keeps them from attacking us.

I have the charisma of the chipmunk. I never have thought I was smart. I thought the people I dealt with were dumb.