* “Our country is in great shape. … Our past is not a burden to be cast away.”–President Donald Trump, during the July 4th “Salute to America”
* “At a certain point, (Mark) Esper has to decide when enough of Trump’s degradation of the office of secretary of defense and the institution itself is enough.”–John Gans, a Pentagon speechwriter for former Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter.
* “Our generation and the ones before us haven’t done enough to right the wrongs of the past.”–Prince Harry, in praising young, anti-racism activists.
* “For a man who had grown up in black society in the West Indies, a multi-racial New York or a multiracial America was not unimaginable.”–George Washington University Historian James Oliver Horton, referencing Alexander Hamilton.
* “Slavery, the Civil War, Reconstruction and segregation are never purely historical. They still haunt the air we breathe, or cannot breathe.”–Yale Historian David W. Blight.
* “When black people become police officers, they are no longer black. They are blue. And I have been told this by numerous officers.”–Hank Newsome, chairman of the Greater New York chapter of Black Lives Matter.
* “We should never honor public figures who, by the standards of their own time as well as ours, abused a public trust. Case in point: The more we learn about J. Edgar Hoover, the more outrageous it is that the FBI building in Washington is still named for him.”–Bret Stephens, New York Times.
* “A state need not subsidize private education. But once a state decides to do so, it cannot disqualify some private schools solely because they are religious.”–Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the (5-4) majority in a U.S. Supreme Court decision that states that provide school-choice vouchers to private schools must also make them available to religious schools.
* “I shudder at the prospect of teaching in a room filled with asymptomatic superspreaders; 1,000 of my colleagues feel the same.”–Paul M. Kellermann, 62, an English professor at Penn State University.
* “I want the people of Florida to know we’re in a much better place thanks to the leadership of President Trump, the innovation of American industry and to the partnership that we’ve forged, not just in testing, but in personal protective equipment.”–Vice President Mike Pence in Tampa to meet with Gov. Ron DeSantis.
* “By and large, the virus does not like sunshine, heat and humidity. I’m more concerned about people crowding into A/C and having private parties.”–Gov. Ron DeSantis.
* “There’s no doubt that when we reopened, people started socializing as if the virus didn’t exist. It’s extremely worrisome.”–Miami (Republican) Mayor Francis Suarez.
* “Vice President Mike Pence and Gov. DeSantis have a lot in common–most notably that both failed to effectively address the COVID-19 pandemic seriously or with urgency.”–Joe Biden.
* “While local communities and states and businesses take climate action, what’s been missing is the federal government.”–U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor, chairwoman of the House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis.
* “I support law enforcement, and that means realigning their mandate and stop being asked to respond to the social service needs which our elected officials have ignored for far too long.”–Alma Gonzalez, Democratic National Committee member from Tampa.
* “Reallocating funds from the police departments that soak up so much of city budgets is absolutely necessary.”–Ben Burgis, Jacobin.
* “I think … we are looking for things we can do for our mental health and physical well being, so the zoo certainly is one of the better options”–Joe Couceiro, president of ZooTampa at Lowry Park, which recently reopened at 50 percent capacity.