Jim Lehrer Quotes & Sayings

“There's only one interview technique that matters... Do your homework so you can listen to the answers and react to them and ask follow-ups. Do your homework, prepare.”

“A debate has one purpose, one purpose only, and that is to facilitate the exchange of ideas directly between two candidates, and that's it.”

“I wanted to be a bus driver when I was a kid. I look at bus driving through the eyes of a little boy. I see it as glamorous.”

“You want to see an angry person? Let me hear a cell phone go off.”

“I came from a family of Marines into the family of Marines.”

“I believe an invitation from the Commission on Presidential Debates is similar to a draft notice - a civic responsibility.”

“If we don't have an informed electorate we don't have a democracy. So I don't care how people get the information, as long as they get it. I'm just doing it my particular way and I feel lucky I can do it the way I want to do it.”

“I'm a gatekeeper, and the gatekeepers all used to be mostly old, white men.”

“I've always said this and finally I had a chance to demonstrate it: The moderator should be seen little and heard even less. It is up to the candidates to ask the follow-up questions and challenge one another.”

“There's always a germ of truth in just about everything.”