Howard Baker quotes:

Demography is changing us as we are older societies, we're living longer. How the generations balance each other out, how that affects education and health care.

It is almost always the cover-up rather than the event that causes trouble.

The most difficult thing in any negotiation, almost, is making sure that you strip it of the emotion and deal with the facts. And there was a considerable challenge to that here and understandably so.

Any time the United States government turns over an American citizen, including military personnel, to the government of another country, it is in our nature to want to make sure that they receive the best treatment, the fairest treatment, and the most humane treatment.

In Washington I'm thought of as a conservative, but in Tennessee I'm thought of as a Bolshevik.

The most difficult thing in any negotiation, almost, is making sure that you strip it of the emotion and deal with the facts.

I intend to travel to Okinawa and to visit with Okinawa officials and the citizens of Okinawa at an early date. I will send my best analysis of that situation, including the local attitudes, back to Washington, to the government there.

If you don't like the question that's asked, answer some other question.

We must examine then the concerns of the Government of Japan about the language of the treaty itself - of SOFA - and of the interim and further arrangements that have been made since 1995, and see whether or not we need to make any changes. Those are decisions I cannot make.

I think and hope and believe that the Japanese government and the people of Japan will be happy and content with the progress of justice in this case and that it will not become a great issue in the future.

Eventually, somebody is going to be a hero, and somebody's going to be president. Not necessarily the same person.

Listen more often than you speak.

The beginning of the decline of the Republic was the day they air-conditioned the Capitol.

What did the president know, and when did he know it?

You've got to guard against speaking more clearly than you think.