Monday, Apr. 28, 2003

Verbatim

"It is not like a treasure hunt, where you just run around looking everywhere hoping you find something." DONALD RUMSFELD, Secretary of Defense, on the search for chemical and biological weapons in Iraq

"Wow, this looks like Las Vegas." TYRONE FRANKLIN, Marine captain, on Saddam Hussein's abandoned 1,000-acre compound in Tikrit, which includes monuments, artificial lakes and palaces

"[Vietnam] took too long...If President Bush had been President, we would have won." JAY GARNER, retired lieutenant general charged with leading the effort to rebuild Iraq

"You'd have to go back centuries, to the Mongol invasion of Baghdad in 1258, to find looting on this scale." ELEANOR ROBSON, council member of the British School of Archeology in Iraq, on the looting of Iraq's National Museum

"When House leaders learned about my agreement...they proved tantrums aren't restricted to the 2-years-and-younger crowd." CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Republican Senate Finance chairman, on his effort to reduce the size of President Bush's tax-cut package

"I found the mass murderers I was looking for, and I have outlived all of them...My work is done." SIMON WIESENTHAL, 94, Nazi hunter, telling an Austrian magazine that he is retiring

"I could not be a Senator and a father during this campaign. I could only be a candidate." PETER FITZGERALD, Illinois Republican Senator, announcing that he will not run for re-election in 2004

"I'm telling you that fame and fortune are not what they're cracked up to be." MADONNA, singer and actress, promoting her new album

Sources: AP; New York Times (3); CQ.com Times (London); New York Times; USA Today