The U.S.S. Maine was sent into Havana's harbor to protect American citizens and property and to intimidate the Cubans into behaving. Then it exploded on February 15. It killed more than 250 sailors.

Cuba rebelled against Spain in 1868 and fought for ten years.

On February 25, Theodore Roosevelt cabled naval commanders in the Pacific to prepare for military action against Spain. President McKinley ordered most of the cables undone, but he did leave Admiral George Dewey. Dewey was told to attack the Spanish fleet in the Philippines if the U.S. went to war with Spain.

Late in March, McKinley sent a list of demands to Spain, including; compensation for the Maine, an end to the reconcentration camps, a truce in Cuba, and Cuban independence. Spain accepted all but the last.

McKinley decided he could not stop the cries for war, even after Spain accepted all but the last of his demands. On April 11, 1898 he sent a war message to Congress. Not soon after that, Congress recognized Cuban independence and authorized force against Spain.

Deployment tears your heart in two only reconnected at homecoming.

When you can imagine you begin to create and when you begin to create you realize that you can create a world that you prefer to live in, rather than a world that you're suffering in.

I spent most of my high school years on movie sets and I'd have like one teacher, which was really bad.

The film's star, Eminem, doesn't appear to have a great deal of range, but he can play himself. Even though the protagonist is named Jimmy Smith, the thoughtful '8 Mile' is a raw version of the rapper's own story.

My mindset at this stage, especially after having a daughter it's just changed my whole outlook.

Humans are imperfect. That's one of the reasons that classical and jazz are in trouble. We're on the quest for the perfect performance and every note has to be right. Man, every note is not right in life.

I teach a non-fiction writing class at New York University, and one of my great pleasures is deciding on the syllabus.

I did a play called 'On Golden Pond' in a dinner theater in Maine and then went to New York for a talent competition having put together a three-man juggling routine and some one-liners and I got myself an agent from that.

Burn down your cities and leave our farms, and your cities will spring up again as if by magic; but destroy our farms and the grass will grow in the streets of every city in the country.

Difficult years lie ahead, patience is required.

I'm not bored; I'm not a guy who has nothing to do.

May it be long before the people of the United States shall cease to take a deep and pervading interest in the Fourth of July, as the birthday of our national life, or the event which then occurred shall be subordinated to any other of our national history.

They never were planning to be here. All my family are going to London because they wanted to go to the big one. There was never any showdown - there wouldn't be.

To give without any reward or any notice has a special quality of its own.

Have we been going up and down in business, and are those round about us as yet unaware of our Christian character? Have we never spoken to them the Word of Life? Lord, arouse us to a deep concern for all with whom we come in contact from day to day.

To say that an artist sells out means that an artist is making a conscious choice to compromise his music, to to weaken his music for the sake of commercial gain.

When I make a live-action movie, it's a very physical process. It's like running a marathon.

The key to life when it gets tough is to keep moving. Just keep moving.

Yeah, I'm a spiritual person.

Reading isn't about managing expectations. In certain ways, writing is. You're trying to send signals early in a book about what might be coming later, but I think worrying about the kind of chatter around a book is something I try and stay as far away from when I'm reading.

The fireworks begin today. Each diploma is a lighted match. Each one of you is a fuse.

Jim, as just a spoken poet, was not that good. He needed the music behind him. He felt a security and a sense of abandon when the music existed around him.

Like all the best families we have our share of eccentricities of impetuous and wayward youngsters and of family disagreements

I have been a member of the Microsoft-bashing society for quite some time.