- Stephen Meyers: If you want to be president, you can start a war, you can lie, you can cheat, you can bankrupt the country, but you can't fuck the interns. They'll get you for that.
- Molly Stearns: How old are you?
- Stephen Meyers: How old do you think I am?
- Molly Stearns: Thirty.
- Stephen Meyers: You think I'm thirty?
- Molly Stearns: Sorry. How old are you?
- Stephen Meyers: Thirty.
- [first lines]
- Stephen Meyers: I'm not a Christian. I'm not an Atheist. I'm not Jewish. I'm not Muslim. My religion, what I believe in is called the Constitution of United States of America.
- [makes the sound of crickets, then a bomb falling to the ground, exploding]
- Tom Duffy: Do yourself a favor. Get out, now. While you still can. Go into entertainment or business, go open a fucking restaurant in Costa Rica. Anything. Do something that's gonna make you happy, okay? Cause you stay in this business long enough, you're going to get jaded and cynical.
- Stephen Meyers: Like you?
- Tom Duffy: Yeah, just like me!
- Tom Duffy: [to Stephen] You exude something. You draw people in. All the reporters love you. Even the ones that hate you love you. 'Cause you play them like the pieces on a chessboard and make it look effortless. And we both know how hard it is constantly being on guard, weighing every word, every move. But from the outside, you make it look easy. People are scared of you. 'Cause they don't understand how you do it, and they love you for it. And that is the most valuable thing in this business. The ability to win people's respect by making them mistake their fear for love.
- Molly Stearns: I've been trying to fuck you for a while.
- Stephen Meyers: Wow.
- Molly Stearns: That's kind of a slutty of me, huh?
- Stephen Meyers: How old are you?
- Molly Stearns: How old do you think I am?
- Stephen Meyers: Twenty-one?
- Molly Stearns: Twenty. Yep.
- Stephen Meyers: That's young.
- Molly Stearns: Is that too young to fuck a 30-year-old?
- Stephen Meyers: Well, you see, the laws are different in different states. Here, at your hotel here in Kentucky, it's frowned upon.
- Molly Stearns: Oh.
- Stephen Meyers: But, if we go across the bridge into Ohio...
- Molly Stearns: Where your hotel is...
- Stephen Meyers: Yeah, surprisingly, they're very lax about their child-endangerment laws.
- Molly Stearns: Do you have a car? I don't drive.
- Stephen Meyers: I took a cab.
- Molly Stearns: I have the keys to the campaign bus.
- Governor Mike Morris: Stevie, you still single?
- Stephen Meyers: I'm married to the campaign, governor.
- Governor Mike Morris: He's married to the campaign. Good answer.
- [last lines]
- TV Reporter: We have now Governor Morris' new senior campaign adviser, Stephen Meyers, coming to us from Xavier University where Senator Thompson has just endorsed Governor Morris, essentially ending this primary race. Stephen, can you give us some insight into how this whole thing unfolded?
- Stephen Meyers: I don't care if it's true. I just wanna hear him denying it. If it is true - great! Find out. But, if not, let them spend the day, telling The Post, that he doesn't own a diamond mine in Liberia. Win-Win.
- Ida Horowicz: Mike Morris is a politician. He's a nice guy! They're all nice guys. He will let you down. Sooner or later.
- Stephen Meyers: I don't give a fuck, if he can't win. He *has* to win.
- Ida Horowicz: Or what? What? The world's gonna fall apart? It won't matter. Not one bit - to the everyday lives of the everyday fuckers, who get up, and work and eat and sleep, go back to work again. If your boy wins, You get a job in the White House. He loses, you're back at a consulting firm on K Street. That's it. You used to know that, before you got goosebumpy about this guy.
- Stephen Meyers: I'm telling you: This is the One.
- Ida Horowicz: You really have drunk the kool-aid?
- Stephen Meyers: I have drunk. It's delicious.
- Ida Horowicz: Sexual favors.
- Stephen Meyers: You're engaged?
- Ida Horowicz: If it meant a good scoop, my fiancé will understand.
- Molly Stearns: Anything interesting?
- Stephen Meyers: This is some White Paper I have to hand out tonight.
- Molly Stearns: What's White Paper?
- Stephen Meyers: Negative shit. Our oppo guys do research, we feed it to the press and we see what sticks.
- Molly Stearns: What kind of negative shit?
- Stephen Meyers: You'll read it in the paper tomorrow.
- Tom Duffy: This *is* the kind of shit that The Republicans pull. And it's about time, that we learn from them. They're meaner, they're tougher. They are more disciplined than we are. I've been in this business 25 years and I've seen way too many Democrats bite the dust, because they wouldn't get down the mud with the fuckin' elephants!
- Paul Zara: We have an open seat in the White House. Republicans have dick. They're disorganized, they can't find a nominee that's not a world class fuck up. They look like Democrats.
- Governor Mike Morris: The campaign - how are we doing?
- Stephen Meyers: Oh. Great.
- Governor Mike Morris: Stephen, you are not Paul. I pay Paul, to use the word 'Great', I pay you to tell me the truth.
- Stephen Meyers: We're gonna be fine. We have to do it and it's the right thing to do. And nothing bad happens when you're doing the right thing.
- Governor Mike Morris: Is this your personal theory? 'Cause I can shoot holes in it.
- Paul Zara: I'll be at the event, a little late. These cocksuckers. Fuckin' dirty shit!
- Stephen Meyers: What happened with Thompson?
- Paul Zara: Nothing! Prick. We had him all sewed up, motherfucker! How bad is it?
- Stephen Meyers: I don't know. I just - I'm running the numbers, Paul.
- Stephen Meyers: I just don't want you to think I'm a player.
- Molly Stearns: You are kind of a player. But...
- Stephen Meyers: I was being polite.
- Molly Stearns: Bullshit. You were trying to pick me up.
- Stephen Meyers: I won't be out of this line of work, as long as you are in it, Sir.
- Governor Mike Morris: So, at best you got eight years. And you end up with a nice little consulting firm off Farragut North, making 750 grand a year, eating at The Palm, pimping out ex-senators to Saudi Princes. Pimping out ex-presidents.
- Governor Mike Morris: Are you fucking kidding me? I'm gonna give Secretary of State to a guy who wants to cut the top ten floors off the U.N.?
- Governor Mike Morris: You know how you fight the war on terror? You don't need their product anymore. Their product is oil. Just don't need it and they go away! We don't have to bomb anyone. We don't have to invade anyone.
- Governor Mike Morris: If I am your President, the first thing I'd put in motion is ten years from the day I take office, no new car in America is run on an internal combustion engine. We will create hundreds of thousands of new jobs. We will start the next technological revolution. And we will lead the world again! Like we used to.
- Governor Mike Morris: The richest people in this country, don't pay their fair share. And when they're asked to, they cry socialism, they use phrases like, 'redistribution of wealth'. That scares everybody and they all run and they hide. For the record, my campaign is vehemently against the distribution of wealth, to the richest Americans by our government!
- Stephen Meyers: Would you keep your voice down? Do you have any idea, what this could do to me?
- Ida Horowicz: Of course, I do. That's why I'm giving you a choice, here.
- Stephen Meyers: I could get fired.
- Ida Horowicz: So, it's not a difficult one, Is it?
- Stephen Meyers: You gotta wake the fuck up! This is the big leagues. It's mean. When you make a mistake, you loose the right to play.
- Ida Horowicz: You give me what I want, I write you better stories. Don't pretend, it's any more than that.
- Stephen Meyers: Ida, you're supposed to be my friend. Why'd you wanna stick the fucking knife at me, on a bullshit story?
- Ida Horowicz: Is that what you thought, that we're friends?
- Stephen Meyers: I've given you anything you've ever wanted. Everything. Every story. Every scoop.. You're entire profile with Paul.
- Ida Horowicz: You're right, you've given me a lot. But, let's get real here Steve. The only reason you've ever treated me well was that I work for The Times. Not because I'm your friend.
- Governor Mike Morris: Ladies and Gentlemen, today marks the beginning of the fight between two sets of ideals. Either we're gonna move forward or we're going to live in the past. Either we're going to lead the world again on technology or we are going to bury, our heads in the sands. The sands of Saudi Arabia. The sands of Iraq. Either we are going to let greed and corruption ruin our industries and our shorelines or we are going to take back our country. We are not a nation used to come in second - or third?
- Governor Mike Morris: You have brought integrity back into this election. Because, that's what this comes down to. Integrity.
- Paul Zara: There's only one thing I value in this world, Stephen. That's loyalty. And without it, You're nothing! And you have no one. And in politics? In fuckin' politics, it's the only currency you can count on.
- Governor Mike Morris: How we project ourselves to the world *matters*. Dignity matters. Integrity matters. Our future depends on it.
- Tom Duffy: Revenge makes people unpredictable, Steve, I can't have someone who's unpredictable, who's unstable.