It’s a good thing God doesn’t let you look a year or two into the future, or you might be sorely tempted to shoot yourself. - Lee Iacocca

Beacham used to talk about street smarts, the things you just know, the basic lessons that can’t really be taught. “Remember, Lee,” he would say, “the only thing you’ve got going for you as a human being is your ability to reason and your common sense. That’s the only real advantage we’ve got over the apes. Remember, a horse is stronger and a dog is friendlier. So if you don’t know a dip of horseshit from a dip of vanilla ice cream — and a lot of guys don’t — that’s just too bad, because then you can never really make it.

We were on a joyride, on free energy almost. [...] It seems to me we need something like the Manhattan Project. We need some urgency saying, "Here's what we should be doing. We've got to get off fossil fuels."

Charlie Beacham used to say that once a guy is over twenty-one, you’ll never really change his style or his habits. You may think you can, but his self-image is locked in. Nobody is ever humble enough to learn after he’s grown up.