Verbatim: Mar. 20, 2006

By DEPARTMENT Monday, Mar. 20, 2006

    • "The United States may have the power to cause harm and pain, but it is also susceptible to harm and pain. So if the United States wants to pursue that path, let the ball roll."

    JAVAD VAEEDI, senior Iranian nuclear negotiator, warning the U.S. not to push the U.N. Security Council to take strong action against Iran for unresolved questions about its nuclear program when the Council meets this week

    "I thought I was being a hero for Enron."

    ANDREW FASTOW, former Enron CFO testifying against former chief executives Jeffrey Skilling and Kenneth Lay, on why he took part in secretive transactions that inflated the company's earnings--and padded his own bank account

    "This is no longer my son."

    AICHA EL-WAFI, mother of convicted 9/11 co-conspirator and al-Qaeda member Zacarias Moussaoui, after her son shouted at his trial, "God curse America! Bless Osama bin Laden!"

    "I have always argued that this was not an anti-Arab issue ... But the perception, whether on the street or the corridors of power, is going to be that it is."

    ALI SADEK, former director of the Arab Monetary Fund, on a Dubai-owned company's decision to pull out of a deal backed by the Bush Administration to run six U.S. ports, following threats by Congress to pass legislation to block the plan

    "I'm looking forward to that headline on Nov. 8: 'No Further DeLay.'"

    NICK LAMPSON, Democratic challenger for the U.S. House seat held by Texas Republican Tom DeLay, after the incumbent handily won his party's primary last week, setting up a fall showdown with Lampson

    "I've said if Ivanka weren't my daughter, perhaps I'd be dating her."

    DONALD TRUMP, during an appearance on ABC's The View with Ivanka, a boardroom adviser on his NBC show, The Apprentice, which started its fifth season last week

    "Librarians give us a scare."

    SISTER MARY CAROL HELLMANN, nun at the Sisters of St. Walburg Monastery in Villa Hills, Ky., former team champion of northern Kentucky's annual Corporate Spelling Bee for Literacy, on the nuns' decision to challenge the defending champion, a team of Boone County librarians, in this year's contest

    Sources: New York Times (2); New York Daily News; AP (3); Reuters