“Bangkok is one of the world's great cities, all of which own red-light districts that find their ways into the pages of novels from time to time. The sex industry in Thailand is smaller per capita because the Thais are less coy about it than many other people. Most visitors to the kingdom enjoy wonderful vacations without coming across any evidence of sleaze at all”

“On any given day in Spokane, Washington, there are more adult men per capita riding children's BMX bikes than in any other city in the world.”

“Any industrial product that comes in per capita quanta beyond a given intensity exercises a radical monopoly over the satisfaction of a need.”

“Writing is a lot like sex: at first you do it because you enjoy it. Then you find yourself doing it with others. But if you're any good at all, you end up doing it for less money than it's worth.”

“There are less than 14 million Jews in the world, compared to the almost two billion Muslims who own most of the oil and natural resources. Yet if you visit any major city in the world, you will find that the best hospitals are named Mt. Sinai, Cedars Sinai, or Albert Einstein because they are hospitals built by donations from Jews for the good of the people. If you go to any major university, you will see how many of the major donors and scholarship providers are Jews. The Jewish people are more likely to give as much they can to charities, and at the same time will be the most value-conscious consumers.”

“But then if you lied to a man about his talent just because he was sitting across from you, that was the most unforgivable lie of them all, because that was telling him to go on, to continue which was the worst way for a man without real talent to waste his life, finally. But many people did just that, friends and relatives mostly.”