Donna: You took funding for remote prayer to the President?
Josh: I did it with gusto.
Donna: That's 'cause you don't know the story of Fishhooks McCarty.
Josh: Is this a real person or a Donna person?
Donna: 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."
Josh: Not that there needs to be, but... was there a point?
Donna: You've got health and strength, both of which, coincidentally, I prayed for after hot lead was shot into your body.
Josh: Yeah... You're going to need some Kryptonite, by the way.
Donna: Okay, settle down.
Josh: All right.
Donna: So you've got health and strength.
Josh: And we'll steal the rest?
Donna: Bet your ass.
Josh: All right. Good work tonight.

C.J.: Sir, this may be a good time to talk about your sense of humor.
Bartlet: I've got an intelligence briefing, a security briefing, and a 90-minute budget meeting all scheduled for the same 45 minutes. You sure this is a good time to talk about my sense of humor?
C.J.: No.
Bartlet: Me neither.
C.J.: It's just that it's not the first time that it's happened.
Bartlet: I know.
Toby: We're talking about Texas, sir.
Bartlet: I know.
C.J.: USA Today asks you why you don't spend more time campaigning in Texas and you say it's because you don't look good in funny hats.
Sam: It was big hats.
C.J.: What difference does it make?
Bartlet: It makes a difference.
C.J.: The point is we got whomped in Texas.
Josh: We got whomped in Texas twice.
C.J.: We got whomped in the primary and we got whomped in November.
Bartlet: I think I was there.
C.J.: And it was avoidable. Sir.
Bartlet: CJ, on your tombstone it's gonna read 'Post hoc ergo propter hoc.'
CJ: Okay, but none of my visitors are going to be able to understand my tombstone.
Bartlet: Twenty-seven lawyers in the room, anybody know 'post hoc, ergo propter hoc'? Josh?
Josh: Ah, post, after hoc, ergo, therefore... After hoc, therefore something else hoc.
Bartlet: Thank you. Next? Leo.
Leo: 'After it, therefore because of it'.
Bartlet: 'After it, therefore because of it'. It means one thing follows the other, therefore it was caused by the other. But it's not always true. In fact it's hardly ever true. We did not lose Texas because of the hat joke. Do you know when we lost Texas?
C.J.: When you learned to speak Latin?
Bartlet: Go figure.

Operator: Hello, welcome to the Butterball Hotline.
Toby: What the hell is...
Bartlet: Shhhh. Hello!!
Operator: How can I help you, sir?
Bartlet: Well, first let me say, I think this is a wonderful service you provide.
Operator: Well, thank you. May I have your name please?
Bartlet: I'm a citizen.
Operator: I'm sure you are, sir, but if I have your name I can put your comments in our customer feedback form.
Bartlet: I'm Joe Betherson...ton. That's one 't', and with an 'h' in there.
Operator: And your address?
Bartlet: Fargo.
Operator: Your street address, please?
Toby: [picks up another phone, into it] Zip code, Fargo, North Dakota, right now. [hangs up]
Bartlet: My street address is 114... 54 Pruder Street, and it's very important that you put 'street' down there because sometimes it gets confused with Pruder Way and Pruder Lane. Apartment 23 R... Fargo, North Dakota... [Charlie walks in with a piece of paper, Bartlet grabs it.] Zip code 50504.
Operator: Thank you. Your voice sounds very familiar to me.
Bartlet: I do radio commercials for... products.
Operator: And how can I help you?
Bartlet: [sits down] Stuffing should be stuffed inside the turkey, am I correct?
Operator: It can also be baked in a casserole dish.
Bartlet: Well, then we'd have to call it something else, wouldn't we? [Toby sits down and puts his hand under his chin.]
Operator: I suppose.
Bartlet: If I cook it inside the turkey, is there a chance I could kill my guests? I'm not saying that's necessarily a deal-breaker.
Operator: Well, there are some concerns. Two main bacterial problems are Salmonella and Campylobacter jejuni.
Bartlet: All right. Well, first of all, I think you made the second bacteria up, and second of all, how do I avoid it?
Operator: Make sure all the ingredients are cooked first. Sauté any vegetables, fried sausage, oysters, etc.
Bartlet: Excellent! Let's talk temperature.
Operator: One hundred and sixty-five degrees.
Bartlet: No, see, I was testing you! The USDA calls for turkeys to be cooked to an internal temperature of 180 to 185 degrees.
Operator: Yes, sir, I was talking about the stuffing which you want to cook to 165 to avoid health risks.
Bartlet: Okay. Good testing!
Operator: Do you have an accurate thermometer?
Bartlet: Oh yeah. It was presented to me as a gift from the personal sous chef to the king of... [Toby raises his hand and Bartlet catches himself] auto sales in...
Toby: [whispering] Fargo.
Bartlet: Fargo. Phil Baharnd. The man can sell a car like... well, like anything.
Operator: Very good, sir. You have a good Thanksgiving!
Bartlet: And you do, too. Thanks a lot! [hangs up the phone] That was excellent! We should do that once a week.

Santos: Do you want a President who will get out of the way when airline executives are putting their companies into bankruptcy so that they can avoid the pension responsibilities to the workers that have dedicated their lives to those companies?
Vinick: Some of our older airlines are having trouble meeting their huge pension obligations at the very same time when they're facing intense competition from low-cost airlines that are so new they don't yet have pensions to pay. Now, an unthinking liberal will describe the airline bankruptcies as the evil capitalists screwing the workers.
Santos: I didn't say that Senator and I don't think you should put words in my mouth.
Vinick: No. Of course you didn't say it. You're not an unthinking liberal. Are you?
[The audience laughs and applauds.]
Santos: I know you like to use that word 'liberal' as if it were a crime.
Vinick: No. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have used that word. I know Democrats think liberal is a bad word. So bad you had to change it. What do you call yourselves now, progressives? Is that it?
Santos: It's true. Republicans have tried to turn liberal into a bad word. Well, liberals ended slavery in this country.
Vinick: A Republican President ended slavery.
Santos: Yes, a liberal Republican; Senator, what happened to them? They got run out of your party! What did liberals do that was so offensive to the Republican Party? I'll tell you what they did. Liberals got women the right to vote. Liberals got African-Americans the right to vote. Liberals created Social Security and lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty. Liberals ended segregation. Liberals passed the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act. Liberals created Medicare. Liberals passed the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act. What did Conservatives do? They opposed them on every one of those things, every one. So when you try to hurl that label at my feet, 'Liberal,' as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, it won't work, Senator, because I will pick up that label and I will wear it as a badge of honor.

[Bartlet stands alone in the Oval Office, in the middle of a raging storm. The back door suddenly flies open]
Bartlet: God damn it...Mrs. Landingham!
[Mrs. Landingham suddenly walks through the main door of the Oval Office]
Mrs. Landingham: I really wish you wouldn't shout, Mr. President.
[Bartlet stares at her for a few seconds]
Bartlet: The door keeps blowing open.
Mrs. Landingham: You could have used the intercom to call me, you know.
Bartlet: I know, but I didn't want to-
Mrs. Landingham: You didn't want to, or you didn't know how?
Bartlet: It's not that I don't know how. It's just that I haven't learned yet.
[Pause. Mrs. Landingham smiles at him]
Bartlett: I have MS, and I didn't tell anybody.
Mrs. Landingham: Yeah. So, you're having a little bit of a day.
Bartlett: You're going to make jokes?
Mrs. Landingham: God doesn't make cars crash and you know it. Stop using me as an excuse.
Bartlett: The Party's not going to want me to run.
Mrs. Landingham: The Party'll come back. You'll get them back.
Bartlett: I've got a secret for you, Mrs. Landingham, I've never been the most popular man in the Democratic Party.
Mrs. Landingham: I've got a secret for you, Mr. President. Your father was a prick who could never get over the fact that he wasn't as smart as his brothers. Are you in a tough spot? Yes. Do I feel sorry for you? I do not. Because there are people way worse off than you.
Bartlett: Give me numbers.
Mrs. Landingham: I don't know numbers. You give them to me.
Bartlett: How about a child born this minute has one in five chances of being born into poverty?
Mrs. Landingham: How many Americans don't have health insurance?
Bartlett: 44 million.
Mrs. Landingham: What's the number one cause of death for black men under 35?
Bartlett: Homicide.
Mrs. Landingham: How many Americans are behind bars?
Bartlett: Three million.
Mrs. Landingham: How many Americans are drug addicts?
Bartlett: Five million.
Mrs. Landingham: And one in five kids in poverty?
Bartlett: That's thirteen million American children. 3.5 million kids go to schools that are literally falling apart. We need 127 billion in school construction, and we need it today!
Mrs. Landingham: To say nothing of 53 people trapped in an embassy.
Bartlett: Yes.
Mrs. Landingham: You know, if you don't want to run again, I respect that. [stands up] But if you don't run 'cause you think it's gonna be too hard or you think you're gonna lose - well, God, Jed, I don't even want to know you.

Mandy: What about a negotiator?
Military officer: Negotiate what?
Mandy: A peaceful settlement.
Josh: This is a stand off with federal officers. A peaceful settlement is "put your guns down, you're under arrest."
Mandy: I think it would be wise if we demonstrated that we exhausted every possible peaceful solution before we got all Ramboed up.
Josh: I don't think it's unreasonably macho for the White House to be aggressive in preserving democracy.
Mandy: Let me tell you something. Ultimately, it is not the nuts that are the greatest threat to democracy, as history has shown us over and over and over again, the greatest threat to democracy is the unbridled power of the state over its citizens. Which, by the way, that power is always unleashed in the name of preservation.
Josh: This isn't abstract, Mandy. This isn't a theoretical problem. The FBI says come out with your hands up, you come out with your hands up. At which point, you're free to avail yourself of the entire justice system.
Mandy: Do you really believe that? Or are you just pissed off because I got into the game?

Moderator: Governor Ritchie, many economists have stated that the tax cut, which is the centerpiece of your economic agenda, could actually harm the economy. Is now really the time to cut taxes?
Gov. Ritchie: You bet it is. We need to cut taxes for one reason - the American people know how to spend their money better than the federal government does.
Moderator: Mr. President, your rebuttal.
Bartlet: There it is. That's the ten word answer my staff's been looking for for two weeks. There it is. Ten-word answers can kill you in political campaigns. They're the tip of the sword. Here's my question: What are the next ten words of your answer? Your taxes are too high? So are mine. Give me the next ten words. How are we going to do it? Give me ten after that, I'll drop out of the race right now. Every once in a while... every once in a while, there's a day with an absolute right and an absolute wrong, but those days almost always include body counts. Other than that, there aren't very many unnuanced moments in leading a country that's way too big for ten words. I'm the President of the United States, not the President of the people who agree with me. And by the way, if the left has a problem with that, they should vote for somebody else.

Leo: Listen up. Our ground game isn't working; we're gonna put the ball in the air. If we're gonna walk into walls, I want us running into them full-speed.
Josh: What are you saying?
Leo: Well, you can start by telling the Hill the President's named his nominees to the FEC. And we're gonna lose some of these battles. And we might even lose the White House. But we're not going to be threatened by issues: we're going to put 'em front and center. We're gonna raise raise the level of public debate in this country, and let that be our legacy. That sound alright to you Josh?
Josh: I serve at the pleasure of the President of the United States.
Leo: Yeah?
CJ: I serve at the pleasure of the President.
Sam: I serve at the pleasure of President Bartlet.
Leo: Toby?
Toby: I serve at the pleasure of the President.

Sam: In 1787, there was a sizable block of delegates who were initially opposed to the Bill of Rights. This is what a member of the Georgia delegation had to say by way of opposition; 'If we list a set of rights, some fools in the future are going to claim that people are entitled only to those rights enumerated and no others.' So the Framers knew�
Harrison: Were you just calling me a fool, Mr. Seaborn?
Sam: I wasn't calling you a fool, sir. The brand new state of Georgia was.

[Josh is in his office, with Schubert's "Ave Maria" playing on his boombox]
Josh: C.J., an N.S.C. staffer gave me a card with instructions on it for what I'm supposed to do in the event of a nuclear attack. They want me up in the plane or down in a bunker. They don't want you... or Sam, or Toby, for that matter. I didn't want to be friends with you and have you not know.
C.J.: [surprised] Josh, have you been upset about this?
Josh: Yes.
C.J.: You're very sweet sometimes. You really are.
Josh: C.J...
C.J.: Of course they don't want me, Josh! I'm a press secretary. I don't think they're going to be issuing a whole lot of releases. Sam and Toby are communications and my guess is that speech writing won't be a priority either. Come, have some fun. [starts to leave]
Josh: [points at his boombox] This is a beautiful piece of music. Do you know this?
C.J.: ...I'm Catholic.
Josh: Hang on. Listen. Listen. [turns up his boombox at the words "O Jungfrau, sieh der Jungfrau Sorgen"] There, right there. It's... miraculous. [beat] Schubert was crazy, you know. [C.J. nods and says "Yes"] Do you think you have to be crazy to create something powerful?
C.J.: Josh, the Cold War is over. There's not going to be a nuclear�
Josh: God, C.J. It's not going to be like that. It's not gonna be the red phone and nuclear bombs.
C.J.: What's it going to be?
Josh: It's going to be this! It's going to be something like this. Smallpox has been gone for fifty years. No one has an acquired immunity. Flies through the air. You get it, you carry a ten foot cloud around with you. One in three people die. If 100 people in New York City got it, you'd have to encircle them with 100 million vaccinated people to contain it. Do you know how many doses of smallpox vaccines exist in the country? Seven! If 100 people in New York City get it, there's gonna be a global medical emergency that's gonna make HIV look like cold and flu season. That's how it's gonna be, a little test tube with a... a rubber cap that's deteriorating... a guy steps out of Times Square station, [imitates a smashing noise]. smashes it on the sidewalk... there is a world war right there.
C.J.: We'll make more vaccine.
Josh: You better hurry, 'cause I'm the only one with one of these cards.

Bartlet: Toby's concerned that the peaceful solution I brokered in Kashmir last year was the result of a drug-induced haze.
Leo: I was there with him. So was Fitz. So was Cashman, Hutchinson, Berryhill...
Toby: Well, that's fantastic.
Leo: Toby.
Toby: None of you were elected!
Bartlet: I was elected, they were appointed. The Vice President was elected. He has the constitutional authority to assume my--
Toby: Not last May, he didn't. Last May, when you were under general anesthesia.
Bartlet: That's because I never signed the letter, but I don't think I got shot because I got MS!
Toby: No, I don't think you did either, sir. I meant that during a night of extreme chaos and fear when we didn't yet know if we'd been the victims of domestic or foreign terrorism, or even an act of war, there was uncertainty as to who was giving the national security orders and it was because you never signed the letter. So I'm led to wonder, given your condition and it's lack of predictability, why there isn't simply a signed letter sitting in a file someplace. And the answer, of course, is that [chuckles] if there was aâ€�a signed letter sitting in a file someplace, somebody would ask why. The Commander in Chief had just been attacked, he was under a general anesthetic, a fugitive was at large, the manhunt included every federal state and local law enforcement agency. The Virginia, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware National Guard units were federalized. The KH-10s showed Republican Guard movement in southern Iraq. And twelve hours earlier, an F-117 was shot down in the no-fly, and the Vice President's authority was murky at best! The National Security Advisor and the Secretary of State didn't know who they were taking their orders from. I wasn't in the Situation Room that night, but I'll bet all the money in my pockets against all the money in your pockets that it was Leo. Who no one elected! For ninety minutes that night, there was a coup d'état in this country.
Bartlet: [sarcastically] And the walls came tumbling down. I feel fine, by the way, thanks for asking. [interjecting as Leo tries to speak up] No, Leo, Toby's concern for my health is moving me in ways...
Toby: Mr. President --
Bartlet: [suddenly infuriated, throws a stack of papers against his desk] SHUT UP! [circles around his desk, staring Toby in the face] You know, your indignation would be a lot more interesting to me if it weren't quite so covered in crap!
Charlie: [poking his head in] Sir...
Bartlet: [sharply] Yeah?
Charlie: Mr. Garrett.
Bartlet: Thanks. [glares back at Toby] Are you pissed because I didn't say anything, or are you pissed because there are fifteen people who knew before you did? I feel fine, by the way, thanks for asking.

Babish: You broke some laws, Abbey, and quite frankly you should be ashamed of yourself, but this investigation isn't about that.
Abbey: Look�
Babish: It's about the criminalization of politics. An attempt to do in the hearing room what they couldn't do at the ballot box.
Abbey: I understand, but we don't have the luxury...
Babish: Abbey, stop eating fruits, stop eating vegetables, it's doing something bad to you. Fruits and vegetables will seduce you, like a woman, with their...
Abbey: Oliver!
Babish: Truth isn't a luxury. You're going to go in there, you're going to swear an oath, you're going to get asked questions, and you're going to tell the truth. It's the way you stand up and say 'Stop!'
Abbey: You should be careful, Oliver. You keep talking like a person, they're going to kick you out of the bar.
Babish: I've been kicked out of bars before.
Abbey: I meant�
Babish: I know what you meant.

Bartlet: What's the virtue of the proportional response?
Admiral Fitzwallace: I'm sorry?
Bartlet: What is the virtue of a proportional response? Why's it good? They hit an airplane, so we hit a transmitter, right? That's a proportional response.
Admiral Fitzwallace: Sir, in the case of Pericles 1 --
Bartlet: [talking over him] They hit a barracks, so we hit two transmitters.
Admiral Fitzwallace: That's roughly it, yes, sir.
Bartlet: This is what we do. I mean, this is what we do.
Leo: Yes, sir, it's what we do. It's what we've always done.
Bartlet: Well, if it's what we do, if it's what we've always done, don't they know we're going to do it?
Leo: Sir, if you'd turn your attention to Pericles 1 --
Bartlet: I have turned my attention to Pericles 1. It's two ammo dumps, an abandoned railroad bridge and a Syrian intelligence agency.
Admiral Fitzwallace: Those are four highly-rated targets, sir.
Bartlet: But they know we're gonna do that. They know we're gonna do that! Those areas have been abandoned for three days now. We know that from the satellite, right? We have the intelligence. [over Leo's attempt to speak up] They did that, so we did this. It's the cost of doing business. It's been factored in, right?
Leo: Mr. President --
Bartlet: Am I right, or am I missing something here?
Admiral Fitzwallace: No, sir. You're right, sir.
Bartlet: Then I ask again, what is the virtue of a proportional response?
Admiral Fitzwallace: It isn't virtuous, Mr. President. It's all there is, sir.
Bartlet: It is not all there is.
Leo: Sir, Admiral Fitzwallace --
Admiral Fitzwallace: Excuse me, Leo...pardon me, Mr. President, just what else is there?
Bartlet: The disproportional response. Let the word ring forth, from this time and this place, gentlemen, you kill an American, any American, we don't come back with a proportional response. We come back with total disaster! [He bangs the table]
General: Are you suggesting that we carpet-bomb Damascus?
Bartlet: I am suggesting, General, that you, and Admiral Fitzwallace, and Secretary Hutchinson, and the rest of the National Security Team take the next sixty minutes and put together an American response scenario that doesn't make me think we're just docking somebody's damn allowance!

Abbey: I was hiking, Oliver. I was hiking. Are you really that much an enemy of nature?
Babish: Nature is to be protected from. Nature, like a woman, will seduce you with its sights...and its scents and its touch...and then it breaks your ankle, also like a woman.
Abbey: What the hell kind of dates are you going on, Oliver?
Babish: I hear ya.

Bartlet: Did you know that two thousand years ago a Roman citizen could walk across the face of the known world free of the fear of molestation? He could walk across the Earth unharmed, cloaked only in the protection of the words civis Romanus -- I am a Roman citizen. So great was the retribution of Rome, universally certain, should any harm befall even one of its citizens. Where was Morris's protection, or anybody else on that airplane? Where was the retribution for the families, and where is the warning to the rest of the world that Americans shall walk this Earth unharmed, lest the clenched fist of the most mighty military force in the history of mankind comes crashing down on your house?! In other words, Leo, what the hell are we doing here?!
Leo: We are behaving the way a superpower ought to behave.
Bartlet: Well our behavior has produced some crappy results, in fact I'm not a hundred per cent sure it hasn't induced it.
Leo: What are you talking about?
Bartlet: I'm talking about two hundred and eighty-six American marines in Beirut, I'm talking about Somalia, I'm talking about Nairobi-
Leo: And you think ratcheting up the body count's gonna act as a deterrent?
Bartlet: You're damn right I-
Leo: Oh, then you are just as stupid as these guys who think capital punishment is going to be a deterrent for drug kingpins. As if drug kingpins didn't live their day to day lives under the possibility of execution, and their executions are a lot less dainty than ours and tend to take place without the bother and expense of due process. So, my friend, if you want to start using American military strength as the arm of the Lord, you can do that. We're the only superpower left. You can conquer the world, like Charlemagne! But you better be prepared to kill everyone. And you better start with me, because I will raise up an army against you and I will beat you!
Bartlet: He had a ten day old baby at home.
Leo: I know.
Bartlet: We are doing nothing.
Leo: We are not doing nothing.
Bartlet: We're destroying-
Leo: Four high-rated military targets!
Bartlet: And this is good?
Leo: Of course it's not good. There is no good. It's what there is! It's how you behave if you're the most powerful nation in the world. It's proportional, it's reasonable, it's responsible, it's merciful! It's not nothing. Four high-rated military targets.
Bartlet: Which they'll rebuild again in six months.
Leo: Then we'll blow 'em up again in six months! We're getting really good at it... It's what our fathers taught us.
Bartlet: Why didn't you say so? Oh, Leo...when I think of all the work you put in to get me to run and all the work you did to get me elected...I could pummel your ass with a baseball bat.