Verbatim

"You ought to just back off, take a look at it, relax, understand that it's complicated." DONALD RUMSFELD, Defense Secretary, when asked about reports, denied by Baghdad, that the U.S. and Iraq had set a timeline for Iraq to take more control of its security. October was the year's bloodiest month for U.S. troops in Iraq. As of last week, 96 had died

"My high school picture was cute." HILLARY CLINTON, Democratic Senator from New York, after her G.O.P. opponent, John Spencer, said, "I don't know why Bill married her" and suggested she'd had millions of dollars of plastic surgery

"If you weren't sitting in that chair, I'd slap you across the face." BARBARA CUBIN, Republican Representative from Wyoming, to her wheelchair-bound Libertarian challenger, Thomas Rankin, after a debate in which he criticized her for accepting donations from disgraced ex--House majority leader Tom DeLay

"If you take out uncovered meat and place it outside on the street or in the garden or in the park or in the backyard without a cover, and the cats come and eat it, whose fault is it--the cats' or the uncovered meat?" SHEIK TAJ ALDIN AL HILALI, Muslim cleric in Australia, implying in a sermon that it would be the fault of an unveiled woman if she was raped because her lack of a covering would tempt men

"Are we worshipping Bono? Absolutely not. No more so than we worship Martin Luther when we sing A Mighty Fortress Is Our God." PAIGE BLAIR, Episcopal priest in York Harbor, Maine, who created a worship service in which U2's songs are used as hymns

Sources: U.S. Department of Defense; New York Daily News; AP; Australian Associated Press; USA Today

TIME Mobile: Now you can read Quotes of the Day from TIME.com on the Web browser of your cell phone or mobile device. Go to mobile.time.com