When President George W. Bush attempted to reform Social Security, that proposal was more unpopular with Americans than the Iraq war. People love their entitlements.
As an American, and especially as a Christian, I am convinced that a love for our own people is not a bad thing, but love doesn't stop at borders. Love is infinitely boundless and all about holy trespassing and offensive friendships.
I knew Bobby Dylan back in the days when he lived in the village. He used to come and see me and sing songs for me, saying they ought to go into my next collected book on American folk music.
I had no intention of becoming a performer, and yet under miraculous circumstances I was brought into the music industry fold. If divine powers hadn't intervened, I'd still be living in China working in some area of Sino-American comparative law.
Hip hop is the new rock n' roll, you know what I mean? And anybody who doesn't think that is just sort of living in the past. It's all just American music, really, when you get right down to it.
The first concert that my parents took me to was in this canyon in Saudi Arabia called Buttermilk Canyon. You sleep under the stars in the desert, and ex-pats - German, Swiss, Canadian, American - would play classical music that filled the whole cany...
Since I was a kid, I've had an absolute obsession with particular kinds of American music. Mississippi Delta blues of the Thirties, Chicago blues of the Fifties, West Coast music of the mid-Sixties - but I'd never really touched on dark Americana.
Many medical students, like most American patients, confuse science and technology. They think that what it means to be a scientific doctor is to bring to bear the maximum amount of technology on any given patient. And this makes them dangerous.
Even putting aside the Judeo-Christian morality upon which the Constitution and our nation's culture are based, the notion of forced euthanasia would contradict the long-held body of medical ethics to which all American doctors must adhere.
If one of us, any of us, any American is traveling in a town somewhere in America and a medical crisis hits them, for someone who is diabetic or perhaps has heart disease or some other problems, where do we get the records to determine what to do?
I'm an American designer. It's important to riff on that. I remember, when my mom and I first came to the States, she was so shocked that everyone was so dressed down in sandals and shorts. It's not quite like that in Asia. To give that a superluxuri...
I've done all kinds of movies, but I wanna do some more independent films that are not your run-of-the-mill type movies like 'American Splendor', which I had a big part in, that are really trying to do something unique.
I got to learn from the American audience. Hearing what it is they're not getting. These are audiences, 35 to 40, an older demographic that controls seven to 10 trillion dollars. And the producers and distributors have convinced themselves this group...
Gene Kranz: We've never lost an American in space, we're sure as hell not gonna lose one on my watch! Failure is not an option.
Lester Burnham: [narrating] It's a great thing when you realize you still have the ability to surprise yourself.
Angela Hayes: Yeah? Well, at least I'm not ugly! Ricky Fitts: Yes, you are. And you're boring, and you're totally ordinary, and you know it.
Lester Burnham: Look at me, jerking off in the shower... This will be the high point of my day; it's all downhill from here.
Carolyn Burnham: Honey, I'm so proud of you. I watched you very closely, and you didn't screw up once!
Jane Burnham: [turning the camera on Ricky] Don't you feel naked? Ricky Fitts: [looking down, grinning] I am naked.
Lester Burnham: You better watch yourself, Jane, or you're going to turn into a real BITCH, just like your MOTHER!
Ricky Fitts: My dad thinks I paid for all this with catering jobs. Never underestimate the power of denial.
