What I bring to the interview is respect. The person recognizes that you respect them because you're listening. Because you're listening, they feel good about talking to you. When someone tells me a thing that happened, what do I feel inside? I want to get the story out. It's for the person who reads it to have the feeling . . . In most cases the person I encounter is not a celebrity; rather the ordinary person. "Ordinary" is a word I loathe. It has a patronizing air. I have come across ordinary people who have done extraordinary things. (p. 176)

I have a big mouth, and I never met a petition I didn't like, so of course in the McCarthy days I got in trouble.

When it comes to the news, the corporate view is `objective,' all else is propaganda.

If there is knowledge, it lies in the fusion of the book and the street.

But once you become active in something, something happens to you. You get excited and suddenly you realize you count.

People are hungry for stories. It's part of our very being. Storytelling is a form of history, of immortality too. It goes from one generation to another. -Studs Terkel

We hear the term independent contractors in Iraq. Independent contractors? Mercenaries!