Stephen Colbert/Quotes

"I want to thank Comedy Central for picking up the show, but more importantly I want to congratulate Comedy Central for picking up the show."

—Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report

"Good news, America! Today you are completely safe and have nothing to fear. It's time for the SafetyUp! No, wait, today's opposite day. ThreatDown!"

—Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report

"If our Founding Fathers wanted us to care about the rest of the world, they wouldn't have declared their independence from it."

—Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report

"Ignorance is bliss. Oedipus ruined a great sex life by asking too many questions."

—Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report

"Historically, syphilis is right up there with Germans. It wiped out the Romanovs, it decimated our fleet at Pearl Harbor, and of course, Fidel Castro impersonated Marilyn Monroe and gave President Kennedy a case of syphilis so severe that eventually it blew the back of his head off."

—Stephen Colbert, Strangers with Candy

"Reality has a well-known liberal bias."

—Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report

"You're saying sensible things! It's going horribly wrong!"

—Particle physicist Brian Cox after Colbert accidentally grasps particle physics.

"I've always been a big fan of beauty. Sure, you can't judge a book by its cover but who wants to have sex with a book?"

—Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report

"Take it from me, there's nothing like a job well done, except the quiet enveloping darkness at the bottom of a bottle of Jim Beam after a job done any way at all."

—Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report

"Now, I don't see color. People tell me I'm white and I believe them because police officers call me "sir"."

—Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report

"If you non-Catholic Christians are upset, well, just have your Pope issue a reponse. Oh, that's right, you don't have a Pope because your faith is defective. Sorry, Catholicism is clearly superior. Don't believe me? Name one Protestant denomination that could afford a $660 million sexual abuse settlement. I think that Lord has spoken on this one."

—Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report

"Don't be afraid to be a fool. Remember, you cannot be both young and wise. Young people who pretend to be wise to the ways of the world are mostly just cynics. Cynicism masquerades as wisdom, but it is the farthest thing from it. Because cynics don't learn anything. Because cynicism is a self-imposed blindness, a rejection of the world because we are afraid it will hurt us or disappoint us. Cynics always say no. But saying yes begins things. Saying yes is how things grow. Saying yes leads to knowledge. "Yes" is for young people. So for as long as you have the strength to, say yes."

—Stephen Colbert, Knox College Commencement Address, 2006

"Hillary Clinton said one of her favorite movies is The Wizard of Oz. Well, I re-watched it recently, and I can't believe I never noticed the liberal subtext before. Judy Garland--gay icon--stars as Dorothy, an innocent girl from the Heartland, who gets swept away to a drug-induced fantasy land where's she's greeted by labor activists from the local guild. After she murders a powerful Oz official, she becomes a fugitive, hitting the road with a racially diverse group including a laborer, an animal-rights activist, and a treehugger. Who are all, for some mysterious reason, great dancers. And along the way, they get so high on poppies they think they're being attacked by flying monkeys. Folks, there's a short walk from "There's no place like home" to 'It Takes a Village.'"

—Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report

"Am I right?" [applause] "Evidently I'm right."

—Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report