Verbatim
'I don't know if the ghosts are going to be there. You can feel that, standing here--Babe Ruth, DiMaggio.' ALEX ALICEA, Union City, N.J., baseball fan, on the new Yankee Stadium
'Economic Pearl Harbor.' WARREN BUFFETT, investor, describing the nation's financial crisis, after purchasing $5 billion in Goldman Sachs Group stock
'America is like my distant uncle who doesn't remember my name but occasionally gives me pocket money.' CHIMAMANDA NGOZI ADICHIE, Nigerian writer, on receiving a $500,000 "genius award" from the MacArthur Foundation
'If I were to ever build a house on the coast, I'm going to contact the guy who built this.' AARON REED, spokesman for the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, marveling at a lone house that withstood Hurricane Ike
'Both the United States Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense have doctorates in Russian studies. A fat lot of good that's done us.' ROBERT M. GATES, Defense Secretary, on the U.S.'s strained ties with Russia
'This is an act of banditry, not of terrorism.' EGYPTIAN TOURISM MINISTRY, in a statement after gunmen kidnapped 19 tourists and their guides during an Egyptian desert safari
'It's the public school system. Let's be honest--it's full of liberal loons.' DANN DALTON, father of an 11-year-old Colorado boy who was suspended for wearing a T shirt with the slogan obama is a terrorist's best friend
Back & Forth:
Abortion
'A variety of things debunked by the medical community are advertised on the Internet.' KIM GANDY, president of the National Organization for Women, criticizing Google's decision to display antiabortion ads from religious groups "in a factual way"
'The issue of abortion is an emotive subject, and Google does not take a particular side.' GOOGLE, in a statement explaining its new policy as part of an out-of-court settlement with a British Christian organization
Media
'Whatever the New York Times once was, it is today not by any standard a journalistic organization.' STEVE SCHMIDT, spokesman for John McCain, accusing the Gray Lady of being "150% in the tank" for McCain's Democratic presidential rival, Barack Obama
'It's our job to ask hard questions.' BILL KELLER, the newspaper's executive editor, saying candidates are "not always comfortable with that level of scrutiny"
Water
'To see the Bush EPA just walk away is shocking.' BARBARA BOXER, chair of the Senate's Environment Committee, saying the Environmental Protection Agency bowed to pressure from the Pentagon in its decision not to remove a toxic rocket-fuel ingredient found in the drinking water of nearly 400 sites in 35 states
'We have not intervened in any way.' PAUL YAROSCHAK, Pentagon deputy director for emerging contaminants, saying the EPA's decision was based on the Safe Drinking Water Act
For daily sound bites, visit time.com/quotes
Sources: New York Times; CNBC; New York Times; CNN; AP; AFP; Wall Street Journal