I like your sass.
You've got a very nice sass yourself... sir.
What, are you touring?
I could.
S4Guns Not Butter
Mr. McGarry, Mr. Ziegler, Mr. Lyman, Miss Cregg. It's the Temptations! I love you guys!
You only think you've heard everything, but you haven't.
Hit me.
Toby.
James Hoebuck will vote yea ten-thirty if we give him $115,000.
Million?
Thousand. $115,000.
For an RV? What's he want?
An NIH study on remote prayer.
I like it. There should be a button on my desk I can press and forty-nine people instantly pray for me.
We cut farm assistance in Colombia. Every single crop we developed was replaced with cocaine. We cut aid for primary education in northwest Pakistan and Egypt; the kids went to madrassahs. Why weren't you making a case that Republican senators are bad on drugs, and bad on national security? Why are Democrats always so bumfuzzled? By the way, sixty-five more flight schools today. Maisy hasn't found your guy. Don't worry. There are thousands more.
You know something there, General Tso? If you had a story, you'd write it. If you don't have one, shut up. We just lost a vote. We're not bumfuzzled. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to cancel a photo op with a goat.
You took funding for remote prayer to the President?
I did it with gusto.
That's 'cause you don't know the story of Fishhooks McCarty.
Is this a real person or a Donna person?
Corrupt politician on the Lower East Side in the '20s. Every morning he stopped at the St. James Church on Oliver Street and said the same prayer, "O Lord, give me health and strength. We'll steal the rest."
Not that there needs to be, but... was there a point?
You've got health and strength, both of which, coincidentally, I prayed for after hot lead was shot into your body.
Yeah... You're going to need some Kryptonite, by the way.
Okay, settle down.
All right.
So you've got health and strength.
And we'll steal the rest?
Bet your ass.
All right. Good work tonight.
S4The Long Goodbye
[on the phone] No, I didn't mean that you have no social skills, Toby... I'm sorry if you think I was being insensitive to your... I think you're very... you're a very pretty girl, Toby.
Dad... you... cannot expect me to silently do nothing. You're going to require care.
TTal
I wasn't built for it. You came for the prom, not for this.
Reunion. I'm not going.
TTal
Coward. That world, the expertise, the solicitude, no. No, thanks. I want to go down with some silence, with my music, with some grace.
I'll quit and take care of you.
TTal
'We sail,' said Pascal, 'in a vast sphere,' Claudia Jean, 'ever drifting in uncertainty, driven from end to end.' I'd much rather see you on TV, darling, than sitting opposite me, watching a demolition derby going on in my brain.
My name is C.J. Cregg. As you know, I work for the President of the United States. This is why I was asked to make a short speech for our reunion. It's a terrible subject, a terrible idea: The Promise of a Generation. So bad I was going to start off with a joke and fill the whole thing in with more jokes. But I find the topic has gotten under my skin while I wasn't paying attention because every generation has promise and every generation fails that promise in some respects. How can we not? What is promise if not something that's impossible to live up to? My boss had to recently make his case to the American people that he was worth reelecting and it was not an easy process - nor should it be. And in its wake, I've been thinking a lot about civility, civic duty and kindness, and how pervasive and powerful they are. How enduringly pervasive those qualities are in American life and how I see them all around me day after day. America's a terribly difficult idea filled with promise and impossible to live up to. Promise is inchoate and promise is what binds us. Some of us died, some got sick, some got rich, some had bad luck, some of us were fortunate, more than others. But failed promise only truly fails when it leads to lowered expectation.
S4Inauguration, Part I
I have a problem.
Well, you're about to propose the most massive shift in foreign policy since the Marshall Plan and it's going to be wildly unpopular.
All right: two problems.
BBryce
This President can't write himself a blank check when it comes to foreign policy. Especially this President.
'Especially this President?'
BBryce
Yes.
Because of the clause in Article 1 that says not every President gets the full powers of Commander-in-Chief?
BBryce
Are you re-writing the section [of the speech]?
Yes.
BBryce
Dramatically?
Well, I like to think that I have a certain flair...
I throw a rubber ball against the window; that means you come to me. As my frustration level grows, so does the velocity of the ball against the window.
Don't you ever worry about the window breaking?
During moments of peak frustration: when the Speaker of the House threatened to repeal the 16th Amendment, a couple of Yankee games, and when Congress censured my boss...but it's always held up, that window; that window is a game-day player.
[to Carol] Stop trying to get us together, okay? If I wanted Danny I could have him. And he's still a jackass from the foreign-ops vote and many other things, so tell him I'm getting my hair done.
Your hair looks great.
[to Carol] There was no way you could tell me he was right behind me? You couldn't fit that in?
This language proposes a new doctrine for the use of force! That we use force, whenever we see an injustice we want to correct: like Mother Teresa with first-strike capability!
Damn right!
Tickets came.
For?
The balls.
Could you handle mine for me until it's over?
Yeah.
Thanks.
Know what Jack will be wearing? A saber.
God, Donna, please tell me that's not the only thing he's wearing.
No, he'll be wearing his dress blues, Warfare pin, Submarine Officer pin, two Commendation Medals, Meritorious Unit, Purple Heart, Bronze cross...and a saber.
...I'll be wearing a tuxedo from Gary's.
S4Inauguration, Over There
I heard once - I don't know if this is true - I heard once that you convinced the President to let you rewrite a section of the State of the Union with less than twenty-four hours to go. It was the second year and everybody was a Republican, whether they were or not, and people at the DNC had convinced him to include the line, 'The era of big government is over.' And you couldn't live with it. Because government should be a place where people come together and no one gets left behind. An instrument of good. And that's exactly what we heard in the State of the Union the next night.
There were maybe four people in the room when I had that conversation.
Well, if I'd have been one of them, I would have repeated it to everyone I met.
Charlie, I'm gonna change my mind again on the Bible.
[ironically] Mr. President, you have to imagine my utter surprise.
Aren't you afraid that one day I'm just gonna kick your ass like it's never been kicked?
These quotes come from Wikiquote's The West Wing pages and are available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.