Now I'm a failed political consultant. But sometimes fiction has a way of capturing people's imagination in a way that non-fiction doesn't. Conservatives typically haven't written much fiction - specifically political thrillers - over the years to educate inspire and mobilize people on issues of great import but we ought to.

Let me just say that to imagine racism does not exist is imagination. And to imagine that it does not create its own set of problems is true imagination. So let's not imagine that racism is gone extinguished because it's not. We are seeing this in the top levels of the political arena and we are seeing it very very plainly.

There is no connection between the political ideas of our educated class and the deep places of the imagination.

Our democracy our constitutional framework is really a kind of software for harnessing the creativity and political imagination for all of our people. The American democratic system was an early political version of Napster.

Lesbian humor isn't trying to sell anything it doesn't have to sell out. Coming out as a lesbian onstage is still a very political act if it weren't more women would do it.

I think up until the point when we started in the business which was in the early '70s most of the humor was political. The smart humor was political satire.

Political correctness? In my humor I never talk about politics. I was never much into all that.

The comics that are just conversing with you up there and drawing on their own life yeah I guess so. I guess some do political humor some do topical humor but the ones that I like the ones that are appealing to me were guys who were just talking to you about their life.

Down the road I'll probably have a kid or two or three. And there will probably be political events or spiritual things to comment on and humor.

I hope that just what I sing about and how I relate to my audience is as much of a political statement as I need to make.

Even a purely moral act that has no hope of any immediate and visible political effect can gradually and indirectly over time gain in political significance.

The hope of a new politics does not lie in formulating a left-wing reply to the right-it lies in rejecting conventional political categories.

Abstention means you stayed at home or went to the beach. By casting a blank vote you're saying you have a political conscience but you don't agree with any of the existing parties.

Don't kid yourself. President Obama's decision to withdraw 33 000 troops from Afghanistan before he stands for reelection is not driven by the United States' 'position of strength' in the war zone as much as it is by grim economic and political realities at home.

If I were running to be somebody there are a lot of easier sombodies to be. After all running against the incumbent governor of your own party in your home state is not the next logical step in a political life.

While history never repeats itself political patterns do.

My father was my main influence. He was a preacher but he was also a history and political science teacher and since he was my hero I wanted to follow in his footsteps and become a teacher.

Given political history in Chile it seemed to me that there was a critical task of consolidating a democracy and creating healthy civic-military and political-military relationships.

The Middle East has the highest unemployment percentage of any region in the world we have the largest youth cohort of history coming into the market place that frustration does translate into the political sphere when people are hungry and without jobs.

Throughout out history when people have looked for new ways to solve their problems and to uphold the principles of this nation many times they have turned to political parties. They have often turned to the Democratic Party.

I've never been nostalgic personally or politically - if the past was so great how come it's history?

Humanity has experienced many revolutionary changes over the course of history: revolutions in agriculture in science industrial production as well as numerous political revolutions. But these have all been limited to the external aspects of our individual and collective lives.

The truth is of course that history is not completed in modern commerce any more than philosophy is perfected in political economy. In other words there is nothing timeless or God-given about filling stations and penicillin and plastic bags.

I graduated from the University of Delaware with a double major in history and political science.