“Africa is closer to me in every way than Iraq or Syria.”

“Stemming this tide will require much better coordination and information sharing among countries every step of the way. We should not stop pressing until Turkey, where most foreign fighters cross into Syria, finally locks down its border. The United States and our allies need to know and share the identities of every fighter who has traveled to Syria.”

“There was no telling who this head, or this leg, or that arm, belonged to... So I scattered the limbs in my painting and realized that in this way I was getting much closer to the truth than Michelangelo did when he concentrated on every separate muscle.”

“Everyday — it's a gettin' closer,
Goin' faster than a roller coaster.
Love like yours will surely come my way
A hey — a hey hey.”

“You're more than another, there could never be another. To make you feel the way you do.
Ohh, we just get closer. I'd fall in love all over. Every time I look at you.
I don't know where I'd be, without you here with me.
Life with you makes perfect sense, my best friend.”

“To me, the extraordinary aspect of martial arts lies in its simplicity. The easy way is also the right way, and martial arts is nothing at all special; the closer to the true way of martial arts, the less wastage of expression there is.”

“The only way to get closer to God is to imitate Him and not associate Him in any way.”

“Of course painting is ridiculous. But it’s the only way I've got to get closer to life.”

“Fewer are the ways of helping people than of harming them; it is the nature of things, not a consequence of the statistical method. Our world does not stand halfway between heaven and hell; it seems much closer to hell.”

“The greatest thing to come out of this [the war in Iraq] for the world economy, if you could put it that way, would be $20 a barrel for oil. That's bigger than any tax cut in any country.”