Much as I hate to say it, the Second World War did end the Great Depression. I think we solve our problems by killing our boys and others. - Studs Terkel

We thought of the poor, at that time, as quite divorced from us, who were not poor. By the exercise of one’s charity, life could be made all right. You would always have the poor with you, they were the unfortunate, and you made donations. You could handle them. It was mildly unpleasant, but not fundamentally upsetting. Now, for the first time, we face the dreadful reality that we are not separated. They are us. They are something we have made. There is no conceivable way today to say: Fish, and you’ll be all right. In hurt, in anguish, in shock, we are becoming aware that it is ourselves, who have to be found wanting, not the poor.

Curiosity never killed this cat’ — that’s what I’d like as my epitaph

Chicago is not the most corrupt American city, it's the most theatrically corrupt.