Notable Quotables

"For [Democrats], it's just the beginning of an election year filled with many, many surprises. There's trouble everywhere and they know it."

Sen. Scott Brown, R-Mass., ahead of his surprise victory in February.

"We have to pass the [health care] bill so you can find out what is in it..."

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., in a speech to the National Association of Counties on March 9.

"I will never have a heart attack. I give them."

George Steinbrenner, owner of the New York Yankees through 37 seasons and seven World Series championships, who died of a heart attack on July 13.

"If the Chinese government has murdered my father, I beg President Obama to ask President Hu to let us bury him."

Grace Geng, 17-year-old daughter of Gao Zhisheng, the Chinese lawyer whose defense of dissidents, including imprisoned Christians, led to his arrest and disappearance. He was released on April 6 but after two weeks detained again and has not been heard from or formally charged with a crime.

"If I had to choose sides today, I'd choose the Taliban."

Afghan President Hamid Karzai at an October meeting with U.S. officials, including Gen. David Petraeus.

"I think religion is discipline."

Former President George W. Bush speaking to Rick Warren at Saddleback Church during his November book tour. Bush said he reads the Bible every morning: "I think you have to be disciplined, particularly when you're being bombarded with stuff."

"This means that one of their spies is worth two and a half of ours."

A radio presenter in Moscow after the U.S. caught and returned 10 Russian spies and demanded-and got-four top-level informants convicted of spying for the West. The dramatic exchange that included New York socialite-turned Kremlin spy Anna Chapman, took place July 8 on the tarmac at the Vienna airport.

"Where's Helen?"

Statement popularized by Martha Mitchell during the Watergate era regarding Helen Thomas, the once sought after veteran UPI correspondent and senior member of the White House press corps. Thomas quit the corps and her job as a columnist for Hearst Newspapers on June 7 following protests to her comments suggesting Israeli Jews should get out of the Middle East.

"It was like the Jets versus Sharks except there weren't any Jets."

An unidentified White House official arguing that the White House had no choice but to make a tax deal with Republicans because congressional Democrats wouldn't fight extending Bush-era tax cuts.

"Then give us our money back."

S.C. Governor-elect Nikki Haley to President Obama after she asked him to honor his commitment to state taxpayers and allow nuclear waste to be sent to Yucca Mountain. The state has collected $1.2 billion for the plan, she said, and "his answer was no." Haley, in a White House meeting with other governors-elect and Cabinet members on Dec. 9, also asked the president to repeal the healthcare law.