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.

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

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.

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.

There are all the activist groups on every imaginable topic - solidarity groups, environmental and feminist groups - sectors of these movements do very valuable work.

I don't have phobias. I'm pretty laid back. Nothing really bothers me. I can handle things pretty well.

My favorite thing about L.A. is the sunny breezes that mimic the mindset of the energy in the people.

Maven is very much a haunting presence in 'Glass Sword.' His influence is everywhere, and he dogs Mare and Cal like no other. He's my favorite character to write because he's so complex, but also because he affects everyone else so deeply. He's kind of like the source of gravity. Everyone moves around him and what he's done.

Oddly enough, my favorite genre is not fiction. I'm attracted by primary sources that are relevant to historical questions of interest to me, by famous old books on philosophy or theology that I want to see with my own eyes, by essays on contemporary science, by the literatures of antiquity.

Observation and study are necessary to achieve mastery of light and form

Leave the door open for the unknown the door into the dark. Thats where the most important things come from where you yourself came from and where you will go.

I've always enjoyed studying the small clues that indicate a particular class level.

Yeah, I have animosity, a chip on my shoulder. But I love, too.

Mathematicians come to the solution of a problem by the simple arrangement of the data, and reducing the reasoning to such simple operations, to judgments so brief, that they never lose sight of the evidence that serves as their guide.

For every benefit conferred, God is to be praised in his gifts. Otherwise when the time of judgment comes, that man will be punished as an ingrate who cannot say to God: 'Your statutes were my song in the land of exile.'

I'm an old school actor in the sense. More and more now, I play myself as I get older. Even as a writer, I never got typecast. I've always bounced from project to project or initiated my own things.

The green eyes in the carefully sweet face were turbulent willful lusty with life distinctly at variance with her decorous demeanor. Her manners had been imposed upon her. her eyes were her own.

Christina Ricci is amazing, the most professional actor I think I've ever met. You can be chatting with her and when they call action, she's right there.

But I love being scared. I think you're brave only when you do things that scare you. I've always used fear as a motivator. I'm not sure why.

I coined a word the other day, but I forgot what it was. It was a good one, it came to me in a dream.

I had never heard of staph until I got it. Didn't really know what was. Still don't really know what it is, but I know you just don't want to have it.

I always wanted my music to influence the life you were living emotionally - with your family, your lover, your wife, and, at a certain point, with your children.

Being on the cover of 'Vogue' at 15 meant nothing to me. I never really understood what it was they were looking at, what they saw in me.

If the character is true, the movie will fall into place. Or at least that's what you hope.

I don't write poems. I don't give flowers to girls... yet.

Race differences show up early in life.

Death is someone you see very clearly with eyes in the center of your heart: eyes that see not by reacting to light, but by reacting to a kind of a chill from within the marrow of your own life.

I just tried to create a life for myself that's full of fun and fantasy and things that equal laughter. My life's been cartoons and comedy and acting, and it's just been a fun life, man.