Some Republicans gave up on winning the African-American vote, looking the other way or trying to benefit politically from racial polarization. I am here today as the Republican chairman to tell you we were wrong.

I spent my time trying to understand grand jury procedure - a topic about which I never before had the slightest interest.

It really comes down to Mick. He's the one who was constantly trying to get these five people in one room together. This is his love, his baby. It's his band, and there's nothing more he loves to do than get up on stage and play with us.

I was listening to all those lyrics and trying to take in everything that was happening. I was completely excited. It was one of the greatest times that I had listening to music.

The stated mission at the time was simply to use the influence of the entertainment industry to do an accurate portrayal of drug and alcohol abuse. We all admit that we're not trying to censor anybody.

Again, like I said, we're not trying to censor anyone. If you think drugs are cool, fine. Make that movie. We are not going to stop you, or try to stop you, but we would encourage other people to be a bit more responsible about their portrayal of drug usage.

I'm trying to get the record that I made at my birthday party last year, trying to get that out, and the lawyers are diddling around with it and it probably won't be out until next year. I don't know.

Our Age of Anxiety is, in great part, the result of trying to do today's job with yesterday's tools and yesterday's concepts.

Rock and roll doesn't necessarily mean a band. It doesn't mean a singer, and it doesn't mean a lyric, really. It's that question of trying to be immortal.

Trying to force creativity is never good.

Ever since I came to Congress in 1992, there are those who have been trying to silence my voice. I've been told to "sit down and shut up" over and over again. Well, I won't sit down and I won't shut up until the full and unvarnished truth is placed before the American people.

Everybody is just at the start of this huge process of trying to unravel what's going on with the 4,400, where they've been and why they're back and what they're trying to do with us in the present. And we're trying to work out what messages they're sending us.

I tend to discourage people from calling me 'Sir Ian,' because I don't like being separated out from the rest of the population. Of course, it can be useful if you're writing an official letter, like trying to get a visa or something passed through Parliament. They're impressed by these things.

I am playing with the assumptions that we have in our everyday life when we are tripped up or fooled and we learn something, that makes things exciting - I am having fun with that stuff, but you have to manage it so it doesn't get too cute, that's what I trying to work toward.

So, no, I'm not trying to crack into Hollywood, although I'll make films there if they're good scripts.