Quotes of the Day

'Using economics to influence behavior is something this country is built on—it's called capitalism.'
MICHAEL BLOOMBERG, New York City mayor, who is considering charging people a fee for driving into the heart of Manhattan

'If this Virginia Tech shooter had an ideology, what do you think it was? This guy had to be a liberal.'
RUSH LIMBAUGH, conservative radio host, about Cho Seung-Hui, who killed 32 people in the Virginia Tech massacre, in part to act out his aggression toward wealthy people

'I've been in politics long enough to know that polls just go poof at times.'
PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH, when asked by a reporter in Ohio about his feelings that 'everybody and their brother does a poll now'

'Personally, I would prefer to keep the King's rule. But even a good monarchy is seen as an autocratic government.'
KUNZANG WANGDI, chief election commissioner of Bhutan, after the Himalayan kingdom held a mock election on April 21 to prepare citizens for the advent of a parliamentary government next year. King Jigme Khesar Namgyal Wangchuck whose father initiated the move toward democracy, will oversee the switch, although many Bhutanese say they would prefer him to remain in charge

'I am ready to go to jail if necessary, but I want to go back to my country.'
SHEIKH HASINA, former Prime Minister of Bangladesh, after being barred from boarding a flight from London to Dhaka. Bangladesh's interim government has asked airlines not to allow Hasina to fly into the country, after fighting between her supporters and those of political rival Khaleda Zia led it to impose a state of emergency in January

'It's all about the thumbwork. It's about balance.'
MORGAN POZGAR, 13, describing her strategy after winning $25,000 in the LG National Texting Championship in New York City on April 21

Numbers

AUCTION
$30,000 Amount paid for a pair of John Lennon's signature sunglasses at an auction of music memorabilia to benefit musicians affected by Hurricane Katrina
$54,000 Amount paid at the April 21 auction for a saxophone belonging to former U.S. President Bill Clinton

INFRASTRUCTURE
104 Length, in km, of a proposed tunnel beneath the Bering Strait connecting Russia and Alaska, which would be the longest in the world
20 Years the project could take to complete, according to organizers of an April 24 conference to study its feasibility. The 50-km Channel Tunnel between Britain and France was built in seven years

WEALTH
$38 billion Fortune of steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal, the richest man in Britain according to the Sunday Times list of the country's wealthiest people. Born in India, Mittal has made his home in the U.K. since 1995
4 Number of the five richest people in Britain who were not born in the U.K.; the Duke of Westminster, with an estimated worth of $12 billion on the 2006 list, comes in fifth behind foreign-born residents such as Mittal and Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich

AUTOS
2.35 million Number of vehicles sold worldwide by Japanese car company Toyota in the first quarter of 2007
2.26 million Vehicles General Motors sold in the same period, the first time Toyota has passed GM in quarterly sales to become the world's biggest carmaker