From porn peddlers to district meddlers, the following quotes are among the best from the last few weeks.

“There’s no doubt that [President Obama] has a significant interest in higher education. He’s very concerned about the increase in student loan debt.”
— UT System Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa, according to The Texas Tribune. Cigarroa and several other higher education leaders across the nation were invited meet with the president in early December to discuss challenges universities are facing, including graduation rates, student debt and facility usage.

“Choices have consequences. [Abigail] Fisher chose to litigate this case as an individual rather than as a class representative, a decision that gave her many advantages below … The burden is on Fisher, as the petitioner, to establish a clear pathway for this court to address her constitutional claims, and she has not even attempted to make this showing in her certiorari petition.”
— A brief filed by Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott urging the Supreme Court to not hear an appeal of Abigail Fisher v. University of Texas. Fisher, a white female, was denied admission to UT in 2008. If her appeal is successful, Fisher’s case could overturn the 2003 Grutter v. Bollinger case at the University of Michigan, which prohibited the use of racial quotas in admissions decisions at universities but allowed race to be a factor.

“It’s very hard to talk about and especially for me without saying things that are really pretty damaging and sharp. The least one can say is that there has been a very intense personality conflict between [President William Powers Jr. and me], and that undermined our relationship entirely and that is a circumstance that I deeply regret.”
— Larry Sager, former dean of the School of Law, about his relationship with Powers, according to The Texas Tribune. Sager was asked to step down from the school’s deanship in early December because of “deep divisions among the faculty,” according to Powers. Most of the controversy surrounded faculty pay.

“I still don’t quite understand what the risk is, but then again, grabbing a .xxx is pretty cheap.”
— Gregory Jackson, vice president for policy and analysis at Educause, according to Inside Higher Ed. Late in December, individuals and companies could begin buying domain names that ended with an .xxx for websites that featured pornographic material. The UT athletic department, which handles the University’s licensing, preemptively bought several .xxx domains such as TexasSports.xxx and HookEmHorns.xxx, likely to prevent any future porn peddler from using the UT brand name in their endeavor.

“Texas did the best that it could.”
— Texas Deputy Attorney General David Schenk, arguing that the Texas Legislature did not intentionally discriminate against minorities when it drew new district maps last year. The case is currently under review by a three judge panel in Washington, D.C., which began hearing testimony Tuesday.

“Our concern extends beyond SOPA and PIPA: they are just part of the problem. We want the Internet to remain free and open, everywhere, for everyone.”
— Sue Gardner, Wikimedia Foundation executive director, on the site’s decision to black out its English-language web pages today in protest of the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act, introduced by Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, and the Protect Intellectual Property Act, two pieces of federal legislation that have come under increasing fire in recent months.

“He sure didn’t tell me I was going to win.”
— Gov. Rick Perry, reflecting on the criticism he received when he claimed that God called him to run for president and on the state of his campaign for the Republican presidential nomination.