Insight: “Vote Labor, and you build castles in the air. Vote Conservative, and you can live in them.” —David Frost (1939-2013)

Alpha Jackass: “You have to understand that I like Ted Cruz probably more than my colleagues like Ted Cruz, and I hate Ted Cruz.” —Sen. Al Franken

Braying Jackass, part I: “If there is one element that holds together the dominant Republican worldview, perhaps it is a rejection of mercy. … Trump and his allies are only for the winners. If you are struggling to feed your family, you deserve almost no help. If you are an immigrant, you deserve even less. If you are sick, who cares? Trump offers the logic of the GOP in its purest form: a brutal mix of bigotry and cruelty.” —Matthew Sitman

Braying Jackass, part II: “I’m often asked what the secret is … to having a real impact on government. Well, it’s recently changed. I used to say, ‘Either run for office or get a degree from Harvard Kennedy School.’ With this White House, I’d say, ‘Buy Rosetta Stone and learn Russian.’” —John Kerry

Contortion: “It’s not normal for the leader of the country that invented the First Amendment to routinely degrade and even threaten journalists."—John Kerry (The First Amendment was not "invented”; in America, it’s enshrined.)

Non Compos Mentis: “[We] carry multiple concerns in both our head and our heart. Just listening to the concerns around education and climate change, women’s health, child marriage, access to technology, all of those are of course interconnected. We have to focus on each of them in their interconnectedness.” —Chelsea Clinton

Easy for him to say: “We can’t isolate ourselves. We can’t hide behind a wall.” —Barack Obama, who has the privilege of hiding behind a security detail the rest of his life

Late-night humor: “Trump just released his new budget proposal. And Bernie Sanders said his cuts to Medicaid are ‘just cruel.’ But Bernie will get his medicine the same way as always: finding an old pill in his suit pocket.” —Jimmy Fallon