I started thinking as I was coming over here, why is it that Joe Biden — Joe Biden

"Hell, I might be president now if it werent for the fact I said I had an uncle who was a coal miner. Turns out I didnt have anybody in the coal mines, you know what I mean? I tried that crap — it didnt work."

"[T]heres only three things he mentions in a sentence: a noun, a verb, and 9/11."

"@POTUS the majority of the American people are not with you on this one. #CeasefireNow"

"Listen to me, boss," Biden told Obama, according to Obamas recent memoir recounting their conversations. "Maybe Ive been around this town for too long, but one thing I know is when these generals are trying to box in a new president." According to the former Presidents account, Biden brought his face a few inches from Obamas and stage-whispered: "Dont let them jam you."

"While this bill doesn’t do everything I want, it does include actions I’ve long called for that are going to save lives. It funds crisis intervention, including red-flag laws. It keeps guns out of the hands of people who are a danger to themselves and to others. And it finally closes what is known as the “boyfriend loophole.” So if you assault your boyfriend or girlfriend, you can’t buy a gun or own a gun. It requires young people ages 18 to 21 to undergo enhanced background checks. It includes the first-ever federal law that makes gun trafficking and straw purchases distinct federal crimes for the first time. It clarifies who needs to register as a federally licensed gun dealer, and run background checks before selling a single weapon. You know, this is — also provides historic funding to address the youth mental health crisis in this country, especially — especially the trauma experienced by the survivors of this gun violence."

"Israel will not get everything it asks for... I firmly believe that the actions that Israels government has taken over the past several years — the steady and systematic expansion of settlements, the legalization of outposts, land seizures — theyre moving us, and, more importantly, theyre moving Israel in the wrong direction"

"Glen is not a homosexual. Glen is a transvestite, but he is not a homosexual. Transvestism is the term given by medical science to those persons who desperately wish to wear the clothing of the opposite sex, yet whose sex life in all instances remains quite normal. Would you be surprised to know that this rough, tough individual is wearing pink, satin undies under his rough exterior clothing? He is. Then there is your friend the milkman who...who knows how to find comfort at home."

"Ive been taking a closer look at these graduates. They are actually taller, stronger, smarter than we were, smart enough maybe to take our mistakes as their messages, to make our weaknesses their lessons, and to make our example — good and not so good — part of their education."

"In a Thumbnail Sketch here is [the Multiple Drafts theory of consciousness] so far:There is no single, definitive "stream of consciousness," because there is no central Headquarters, no Cartesian Theatre where "it all comes together" for the perusal of a Central Meaner. Instead of such a single stream (however wide), there are multiple channels in which specialist circuits try, in parallel pandemoniums, to do their various things, creating Multiple Drafts as they go. Most of these fragmentary drafts of "narrative" play short-lived roles in the modulation of current activity but some get promoted to further functional roles, in swift succession, by the activity of a virtual machine in the brain. The seriality of this machine (its "von Neumannesque" character) is not a "hard-wired" design feature, but rather the upshot of a succession of coalitions of these specialists.The basic specialists are part of our animal heritage. They were not developed to perform peculiarly human actions, such as reading and writing, but ducking, predator-avoiding, face-recognizing, grasping, throwing, berry-picking, and other essential tasks. They are often opportunistically enlisted in new roles, for which their talents may more or less suit them. The result is not bedlam only because the trends that are imposed on all this activity are themselves part of the design. Some of this design is innate, and is shared with other animals. But it is augmented, and sometimes even overwhelmed in importance, by microhabits of thought that are developed in the individual, partly idiosyncratic results of self-exploration and partly the predesigned gifts of culture. Thousands of memes, mostly borne by language, but also by wordless "images" and other data structures, take up residence in an individual brain, shaping its tendencies and thereby turning it into a mind."

"While our primary goal is to maintain the most powerful military force in the world at the lowest possible cost, we will never be unmindful of those communities and individuals who are temporarily affected by changes in the pattern of Defense spending. Men and women, who have devoted their lives and their resources to the needs of their country, are entitled to help and consideration in making the transition to other pursuits. We will continue to help local communities by mobilizing and coordinating all the resources of the Federal Governments to overcome temporary difficulties created by the curtailment of any Defense activity. We will phase out unnecessary Defense operations in such a way as to lessen the impact on any community, and we will work with local communities to develop energetic programs of self-help, calling on the resources of state and local governments--and of private industry--as well as those of the Federal Government. There is ample evidence that such measures can succeed. Former military bases are now in use throughout the country in communities which have not only adjusted to necessary change, but have created greater prosperity for themselves as a result. Their accomplishments are a tribute to the ingenuity of thousands of our citizens, and a testimony to the strength and resiliency of our economy and our system of government."

"Are people naturally destructive, immoral, predatory and self-seeking, only to be kept in order by harsh laws and fiercely deterrent mandatory sentences? Or are men and women naturally orderly, merciful, humane and bred with a need for justice and mutual aid? Of course these qualities, or defects, are not evenly distributed, and undoubtedly there is much of each in all of us, but when it comes to the law some sort of distinction can be drawn. Are you a Shylock or a Bassanio? Shylock pinned his faith on the words in the contract, the nature of his bond and the duty of the state to uphold the letter of the law regardless of human suffering. Bassanio put another point of view. More important than the sanctity of the law was the plight of the individual parties in the particular case."

"Viewed in the light of such facts, we may conclude slavery to have been the occasion of the increase of human feeling among the Negroes. The doctrine which we deduce from this condition of slavery among the Negroes, and which constitutes the only side of the question that has an interest for our inquiry, is that which we deduce from the Idea: viz., that the “Natural condition” itself is one of absolute and thorough injustice – contravention of the Right and Just. Every intermediate grade between this and the realization of a rational State retains – as might be expected – elements and aspects of injustice; therefore we find slavery even in the Greek and Roman States, as we do serfdom down to the latest times. But thus existing in a State, slavery is itself a phase of advance from the merely isolated sensual existence – a phase of education – a mode of becoming participant in a higher morality and the culture connected with it. Slavery is in and for itself injustice, for the essence of humanity is Freedom; but for this man must be matured. The gradual abolition of slavery is therefore wiser and more equitable than its sudden removal."