Then you get to the last half of the 20th century, Americans are getting very skeptical about their leaders and their institutions, and another place that is affected is parties and conventions.
In England especially, I've found that if you bring up King Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson at a dinner party or a social gathering, it's like throwing a Molotov cocktail into the room.
Name your nation-state, or tribe or party - you have to rationalize what you're doing. You have to go to sleep at night. Does Dick Cheney sleep at night? Does he sleep like a baby?
The Muslim Brotherhood is a religiously conservative group. They are a minority in Egypt. They are not a majority of the Egyptian people, but they have a lot of credibility because all the other liberal parties have been smothered for 30 years.
The most important single central fact about a free market is that no exchange takes place unless both parties benefit.
I'm a very recent convert to the gay scene. I went to a party a couple of years ago and met a very nice man who took me under his wing and started taking me out to clubs. It was a revelation.
Our party cannot be all things to all people. It can't be. Our loudest opponents on the left are never going to like us so let's stop trying to curry favor with them.
To have one's own story told by a third party who doesn't know that the character in question is himself the hero of the story being told, that's a technical refinement.
The 3D world allows you to engage even more with a film because you're somehow drawn into the landscape or the universe of that scene. Even when it's two people talking at a table, you feel like you're a third party.
Missing out an apostrophe or two does not make you an idiot. But equating party allegiance with nationhood certainly makes you a thug. And thugs don't often notice that they're thugs, usually because they're also idiots.
One thing about the fantasy dinner party idea that no one considers is whether these people are going to get on. I would say John McEnroe and Ian McEwan, but what would they have to say to each other?
I'm disappointed that Senator DeWine once again chose to go along with his party leaders and their big corporate lobbyist supporters. Ohio deserves a Senator who will be more than a rubber stamp.
We're so known for our party dresses and evening looks, I wanted to focus on what the Alice + Olivia woman is going to wear tomorrow, during the day and on the weekend, in ways that are sort of fun and sexy.
The Second Amendment is a constitutional right. I didn't make it up, the Republican Party didn't make it up. It's in the Constitution. I think it's just as important as any of the other rights in our constitution.
It has become starkly apparent to me that we lack any sort of strategic foreign policy view, and when I say 'we,' I mean the country in general, but in particular, the Republican Party.
There's no doubt that when the Republican Party took over in 1994, the 'Contract with America' was an opportunity to implement some things - like welfare reform and some of the other initiatives. Then, it kind of lost its steam.
Happy Days, which we did for 11 years, we did with three cameras in front of a live audience. Very special. We had a party every Friday night. The boys, Ron, Henry, they grew up on that show.
I think more so than the Republican Party, we reflect America on the Democratic side of the aisle, and that's a healthy thing. I mean, that's what democracy is all about.
At the end of the day, I have one job requirement right now that's been given to me by the Republican Party and, I think, the American people, and that's to fire Nancy Pelosi.
When push comes to shove, we all should know most Americans want the same things, but just disagree on how to get there, which is why it should be okay to not panic if the other party wins.
Voters tell politicians what they want through the ballot box. Constantly second-guessing them by speculating whether the parties should gang up on each other misses the point.
