I went through all my electric bills, the water bills, the phone bills, elevator contracts, and I found enough wasteful spending without reducing any programs anywhere, without reducing any services, I found enough wasteful spending to pay my entire ...
It's clearly a crisis of two things: of consciousness and conditioning. We have the technological power, the engineering skills to save our planet, to cure disease, to feed the hungry, to end war; But we lack the intellectual vision, the ability to c...
Doubt is a storm. We either ride it out, or we change our course. Neither is right or wrong--to stay or go. Twenty years ago, should you have really married X, or Y? This college, or that? A life-changing decision one makes becomes the right decision...
Oft in the stilly night, Ere Slumber's chain has bound me, Fond memory brings the light Of other days around me; The smiles, the tears, Of boyhood years, The words of love then spoken; The eyes that shown Now dimmed and gone, The cheerful hearts now ...
It's heartbreaking when you hear a kid buying a ticket for... I don't know, whatever movie you're up against. And you see them sneaking into your film. It's just heartbreaking. But in the spirit of full disclosure, that is what I did as an 11-year-ol...
In my day, when I was a young kid, army duty was compulsory in South Africa or you go to jail. I had the choice, so I spent a year in the entertainment unit, and outside of doing shows - and I used to write for, arrange for the big band - outside of ...
Years ago, NPR tried to stop me from going on "The Factor." When I refused, they insisted that I not identify myself as an NPR journalist. I asked them if they thought people did not know where I appeared on the air as a daily talk show host, nationa...
Federal assistance helps millions of Americans escape poverty every year by providing the stability needed to take advantage of new opportunities. In fact, it is our safety net that allows full participation in the economy. More Americans purchasing ...
I usually start writing a novel that I then abandon. When I say abandon, I don't think any writer ever abandons anything that they regard as even a half-good sentence. So you recycle. I mean, I can hang on to a sentence for several years and then put...
I should be able to express moral views on social issues - especially those that have been the underpinning of Western civilization for 2,000 years - without being slandered, accused of hate speech, and told from those who preach 'tolerance' that I n...
I have experienced a murderer among my friends. Many, many years ago. At close range I have seen the impact of it. I knew the victim, I went to the funeral, I have been to the house, to the specific room where the killing took place, and I was stunne...
We've all seen chicken portrayed as the low-fat, heart-healthy alternative to red meat for years, but it no longer adds up. You might want to lean away from eating birds and lean toward more plant-based options of protein like black beans, lentils, t...
My memories of Kabul are vastly different than the way it is when I go there now. My memories are of the final years before everything changed. When I grew up in Kabul, it couldn't be mistaken for Beirut or Tehran, as it was still in a country that's...
I like the fact that by mimicking the way memory works, a writer can actually write in a fluid way - one solid scene doesn't have to fall on another solid scene, you can just have a fragment that then dovetails into another one that took place 30 yea...
I went to high school in Columbia. I met my first wife, Richards, whom I married while I was working on a B.S. in chemistry at Georgia Tech. She bore Louise, and I studied. I learned most of the useful technical things - math, physics, chemistry - th...
We not only heard it before 20 years ago, before George Bush in 2001 passed his tax relief, before in 2003 the tax relief were past, we were told they were dead. Before we provided prescription drugs for Medicare, we were told it wasn't going to happ...
In my last year of drama school, I was Abigail in 'The Crucible' and Nina in 'The Seagull,' and I did some Shakespeare with the RSC. That's what casting directors saw me in, and I got put up for a lot of period drama auditions. I always get told I su...
The seed for my novel 'Half Brother' was planted in my mind over twenty years ago, but didn't germinate until late 2007 when I came across the obituary for Washoe, an extraordinary chimpanzee who had learned over 250 words of American Sign Language.
I'm a huge fan of Canadian rock-and-roll. When I was growing up, Rush came out with a record called Hemispheres, and I must have listened to that record for two years straight. Even when I was asleep I had it on. So, yeah, whenever I hear a Rush tune...
I started writing because it was hard to find acting jobs. I didn't like any monologues in auditions, so I started to write my own things. Since then, I have written a couple of shows. I was nominated for playwright of the year for a play I wrote cal...
About a year ago I got really exhausted from reading bad scripts and I know that I am a writer and that I have stories to tell, so I thought, 'Let's do this!' So I'm co-writing a screenplay now with another screenwriter and loving it. Absolutely lovi...
