Ann Richards

“We're living in a whole new social and economic order with a whole new set of problems and challenges. Old assumptions and old programs don't work in this new society and the more we try to stretch them to make them fit, the more we will be seen as running away from what is reality.”

“There is not a doubt in my mind that the people of America are hunkered down. They are afraid.”

“The here and now is all we have, and if we play it right it's all we'll need.”

“I thought I knew Texas pretty well, but I had no notion of its size until I campaigned it.”

“I did not want my tombstone to read, 'She kept a really clean house.' I think I'd like them to remember me by saying, 'She opened government to everyone.'”

“People don't know that New York really is just made up of a group of very small neighborhoods.”

“Well it's really hard to satisfy the right wing. I can tell you that.”

“Well, you know my number one cause has always been that women's reproductive health needs to be protected.”

“Now we Democrats believe that America is still the country of fair play, that we can come out of a small town or a poor neighborhood and have the same chance as anyone else, and it doesn't matter whether we are black or Hispanic, or disabled or women.”

“Let me tell you, sisters, seeing dried egg on a plate in the morning is a lot dirtier than anything I've had to deal with in politics.”

“I have very strong feelings about how you lead your life. You always look ahead, you never look back.”

“Weight-bearing exercise builds bone density, builds your muscular strength so that you can hold your body up where those bones have a tendency to get weak.”

“After all, Ginger Rogers did everything that Fred Astaire did. She just did it backwards and in high heels.”

“I've had lots of good advice.”

“Sometimes when I'm watching television and something, an image, will come on that has to do with 9/11 or some of these families telling their stories, or children talking about drawing pictures of airplanes flying into towers, you know, I find myself still choking up.”

“I have a real soft spot in my heart for librarians and people who care about books.”

“We're not going to have the America that we want until we elect leaders who are going to tell the truth - not most days, but every day.”

“I have always had the feeling I could do anything and my dad told me I could. I was in college before I found out he might be wrong.”

“I have an awfully good life.”

“I think in the immediate days after 9/11, the administration acted very, very well. I liked the decisiveness of it.”