Barney Frank

“I hope we will not so characterize religious people as being so narrow and so biased towards people not of their own religion that they cannot even work with them in this common cause to which you say they are committed.”

“Community action is as valuable a principle on the international level as it has been domestically.”

“And unless you think there is a serious chance you're going to jail, don't listen to your lawyer.”

“Let us not say that we will decide on a political basis at the national level that no State is competent to regulate the practice of medicine in that State if they decide to allow a doctor to prescribe marijuana, because that is what we are talking about.”

“The regulation of medicine has been a State function.”

“But here too it should be noted that the President's approach was to first ask the repressive and brutal Taliban to surrender Osama bin Laden to us, and only after that government refused to do that did we invade.”

“Now, most of the time I'm going to agree with the Democrats and disagree with the Republicans.”

“It wasn't until after I was reelected in 1982 that I thought of myself as a long-term member of Congress.”

“Legislators have a formal set of responsibilities to work together, but there's no hierarchy.”

“I was still closeted, but from the day I decided to run for office, knowing that I was gay, I decided that I would, of course, still be closeted but that I would work very hard for gay rights. It would be totally dishonorable, being gay, not to do that. So I had that as kind of a secondary agenda.”

“For most of my life, I have eaten to deal with stress.”

“But when others suggested that the poor should not simply be the objects of these programs but also the subjects - that they should be actively involved in shaping the programs, making decisions about how to spend the money etc. - some of the previous supporters reconsidered.”

“Today, many people take for granted the notion that people whose lives are going to be very heavily affected by public policies should have a say in how they are formulated and carried out.”

“This bill is the legislative equivalent of crack. It yields a short-term high but does long-term damage to the system and it's expensive to boot.”

“I'm a good legislator. I'm a bad some other things.”

“I'm used to being in the minority. I'm a left-handed gay Jew. I've never felt, automatically, a member of any majority.”

“What's troubling is that the Republicans to defend Mr. DeLay are weakening the ethics process.”

“There's only one thing you can do in bankruptcy: break your word, break your deals. It allows you to say to the small businesses, who have been catering lunches for you, 'Sorry, we're not paying you.' It allows you to go to the workers and say, 'Sorry, we're not paying you.'”

“Increasing inequality in income distribution in this country has broader policy implications, and there is also the growing problem of perverse incentives that result from executives receiving grossly disproportionate compensation based on decisions they themselves take.”

“Television is apparently the enemy of nuance. But nuance is essential for a thoughtful discussion.”