The relationship between press and politician - protected by the Constitution and designed to be happily adversarial - becomes sour raw and confrontational.

So on May 1 1987 at Gary's invitation I agreed to see him one last time - to confront him face-to-face about his sincerity and with the intention of ending our brief relationship.

When I was confronted with official tuition the academic thing I could see no relationship whatever between that and the music I'd been writing since I was 11.

On the Native American front we have turned a new page in the 400-year history of the interface between the American settlers of this country and the nation's first Americans. That's included a new relationship where the sovereignty of tribes is in fact recognized.

Technology is such a broad kind of term it really applies to so many things from the electric light to running cars on oil. All of these different things can be called technology. I have kind of a love-hate relationship with it as I expect most people do. With the computer I spend so many hours sitting in front of a computer.

We say no to lots of things that would please us. I would like to punch people every now and then but I don't. I would like to have something for free rather than pay for it. I would like to skip to the front of the line... I don't mean to brush aside the taste of meat which is a powerful attraction. But its power is not without limit.

As a person who is not confrontational by disposition I tend to see that the quality of being confrontational is a positive attribute.

I was very aware of office politics because I was so baffled by them. So much so goes unsaid. No one says 'you're a cheeky so-and-so ' no one says 'you're so moody ' nobody ever confronts anyone else about anything. But I'm very crass and I'm very confrontational and I have a temper. I had to be hyper-vigilant in every office I worked in.

Telling the truth and confronting the challenge is what politics is about.

Confronted with the choice the American people would choose the policeman's truncheon over the anarchist's bomb.

I do not see how a man can work on the frontiers of physics and write poetry at the same time. They are in opposition.

Reading a piece of poetry with no beat in front of 20 people is way more challenging than rocking for 10 000 people.

There is also poetry written to be shouted in a square in front of an enthusiastic crowd. This occurs especially in countries where authoritarian regimes are in power.

Poetry is like a bird it ignores all frontiers.

In particular the efforts to reestablish peace after the World War have been directed toward the formation of states and the regulation of their frontiers according to a consciously national program.

I've also gotten to play in front of a million people in Central Park when there was a grass roots movement calling for nuclear disarmament - it was about 1982 - they called it Peace Sunday.

When I was in the White House I was confronted with the challenge of the Cold War. Both the Soviet Union and I had 30 000 nuclear weapons that could destroy the entire earth and I had to maintain the peace.