Q    “We have no doubt that your latest story is (inaudible).  But for those who believe that there is something to it, is there anything that you have learned over these last few weeks that you might be able to reveal that might ease their concerns that this isn’t fake news?  And secondly — ”

THE PRESIDENT:  “I think they don’t believe it.  I don’t think the public would.  That’s why the Rasmussen poll just has me through the roof.  I don’t think they believe it.  Well, I guess one of the reasons I’m here today is to tell you the whole Russian thing — that’s a ruse.  That’s a ruse.  And, by the way, it would be great if we could get along with Russia, just so you understand that.  Now, tomorrow you’ll say, Donald Trump wants to get along with Russia, this is terrible.  It’s not terrible — it’s good.

“We had Hillary Clinton try and do a reset.  We had Hillary Clinton give Russia 20 percent of the uranium in our country.  You know what uranium is, right?  It’s this thing called nuclear weapons and other things.  Like, lots of things are done with uranium, including some bad things.  Nobody talks about that.  I didn’t do anything for Russia.  I’ve done nothing for Russia.  Hillary Clinton gave them 20 percent of our uranium.  Hillary Clinton did a reset, remember, with the stupid plastic button that made us all look like a bunch of jerks?  Here, take a look.  He looked at her like, what the hell is she doing with that cheap plastic button?  Hillary Clinton — that was a reset.  Remember?  It said ‘reset.’

“Now, if I do that, oh, I’m a bad guy.  If we could get along with Russia, that’s a positive thing.  We have a very talented man, Rex Tillerson, who is going to be meeting with them shortly.  And I told him, I said, I know politically it’s probably not good for me.  Hey, the greatest thing I could do is shoot that ship that’s 30 miles offshore right out of the water.  Everyone in this country is going to say, oh, it’s so great.  That’s not great.  That’s not great.  I would love to be able to get along with Russia.”
— Press conference with Pres. Donald J. Trump, Feb. 17, 2017

“The American press is extraordinarily free and vigorous, as it should be.  It should be, not because it is free of inaccuracy, oversimplification and bias, but because the alternative to that freedom is worse than those failings.”
— Judge Robert Bork, New York Times, April 11, 1985

“No woman ever falls in love with a man unless she has a better opinion of him than he deserves.”
— Ed Howe

JOHN DICKERSON: “When I talked to Republicans on The Hill, they wonder, what in the White House — what have you all learned from this experience with the executive order?”

STEPHEN MILLER: “Well, I think that it’s been an important reminder to all Americans that we have a judiciary that has taken far too much power and become in many case a supreme branch of government. One unelected judge in Seattle cannot remake laws for the entire country. I mean this is just crazy, John, the idea that you have a judge in Seattle say that a foreign national living in Libya has an effective right to enter the United States is — is — is beyond anything we’ve ever seen before.

“The end result of this, though, is that our opponents, the media and the whole world will soon see as we begin to take further actions, that the powers of the president to protect our country are very substantial and will not be questioned.”
— Stephen Miller, senior policy advisor to Pres. Trump, on Face the Nation, Feb. 12, 2017

“The rule of law can be wiped out in one misguided, however well-intentioned generation.  And if that should happen, it could take a century of striving and ordeal to restore it, and then only at the cost of the lives of many good men and women.”
— William T. Gossett, president, American Bar Association, Aug. 11, 1969

 

“The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep’s throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty.”
— Abraham Lincoln

“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.  If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.”
— Archbishop Desmond Tutu

“Every society honors its live conformists and its dead troublemakers.”
— Mignon McLaughlin

“What I say is what I say.”
— Donald J. Trump, Presidential debate, Aug. 6, 2015

 

“The law is not always an easy friend, because the law does not play favorites.  But for those who seek justice in a society of responsible citizens, the law will always be an ally.”
— Edward I. Koch, Los Angeles Times, Sept. 8, 1981