Category: Best Line of the Day

Clever turns of phrase, special splashes of wit, provocative insight — all in a sentence or two.

Best line of the day, so far

“The media is working hard to make this into a bi-partisan scandal but that is simple bullshit.”

Digby (Hullabaloo), who adds:

“Just in the past couple of weeks we’ve had news reports about legal trouble for corrupt Republicans George W. Bush, Ken Lay, Tom DeLay, Bill Frist, Karl Rove, Scooter Libby, Duke Cunningham, Ralph Reed and Jack Abramoff. Lot of dots there. Is it too much trouble for the media to connect them?”

Best line of the day, so far

Murrow was one large head staring into the camera and he’s looking at you, talking to you as if you are the most intelligent person on the planet. He talks in measured tone. No image of him being reduced to a tiny box.

I really believe that allows the viewer to draw their own conclusions. But today an event happens and there will be 5 maybe 6 people sitting around talking and discussing with each other, not to us. That, to me, is a decline in the way news is presented.

Actor Frank Langella, who plays CBS owner William Paley in Good Night, and Good Luck. Quoted from a chat room discussion at Gold Derby by Tom O’Neil.

Some late night one-liners

“This year 20 percent of Americans researched their Christmas wish list on the Internet. Which explains why this year’s number one gift item is a hot Asian teen.”

Conan O’Brien

“A lot of Bush supporters are very upset that the TV show “West Wing” has too many Democrats on it. Well, that will balance out. Wait ’til “Prison Break” comes back with new shows – it will have plenty of Republicans in it.”

Jay Leno

Seems like a good new year’s resolution

I had just turned seven and my Aunt Nancy had just passed away, and I didn’t understand and I missed her. I’d locked myself in my grandparents’ room and I was crying on the bed, and my grandmother came and knocked on the door. I let her in and she sat on the bed with me and said, “Now, if you stop crying, I’m going to tell you a secret about your heart.” When you’re a little kid, you really want to know secrets, so this was very good motivation. I stopped crying and she said, “The secret to your heart is that it can be filled up by lots of different things. It can be filled up by sadness, or it can be filled up by anger, or bitterness, but it can also get filled up by love, and joy, and happiness.” She told me that the job for my life was to make sure there was always a whole lot of room for love. That those other things would come in, and when they did, I had to make an extra effort to value love above all else. It’s a very simple lesson, but really the most important one I’ve ever received.

Novelist Kristin Gore, daughter of Al Gore, speaking at her grandmother’s service last year. Via Andrew Tobias.

Best line of the day, so far

“I always had a soft spot for Daschle even though he was still bringing knives long after it had become a gun fight.”

Atrios leading into a discussion on this from The Washington Post:

The Bush administration requested, and Congress rejected, war-making authority “in the United States” in negotiations over the joint resolution passed days after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, according to an opinion article by former Senate majority leader Thomas A. Daschle (D-S.D.) in today’s [December 23rd] Washington Post.

Daschle’s disclosure challenges a central legal argument offered by the White House in defense of the National Security Agency’s warrantless wiretapping of U.S. citizens and permanent residents. It suggests that Congress refused explicitly to grant authority that the Bush administration now asserts is implicit in the resolution.

Here’s the Daschle piece: Power We Didn’t Grant.

Best line of the day, so far

“[M]y biggest concern with the Plasma TVs is where did they get the plasma? Is that why they won’t let anyone see those prisoners? [I]s it some sort of secret blood drive?”

Commenter neilt at Achenblog in reaction to Achenbach writing that the discussion of impeachment at last evening’s party in Georgetown got distracted by some bowl game in hi-def.

Best line of the day, so far

“Those who disagree with our holding will likely mark it as the product of an activist judge. If so, they will have erred as this is manifestly not an activist Court. Rather, this case came to us as the result of the activism of an ill-informed faction on a school board, aided by a national public interest law firm eager to find a constitutional test case on ID, who in combination drove the Board to adopt an imprudent and ultimately unconstitutional policy. The breathtaking inanity of the Board’s decision is evident when considered against the factual backdrop which has now been fully revealed through this trial. The students, parents, and teachers of the Dover Area School District deserved better than to be dragged into this legal maelstrom, with its resulting utter waste of monetary and personal resources.”

U.S. District Court Judge John E. Jones III in his ruling today in the Dover, Pennsylvania, intelligent design case.

Best line of the day, so far

“Jesus says Christmas shouldn’t be about picking fights and organizing boycotts. All that legalistic nitpicking just reminds him of the Pharisees. Do you really think that if Jesus returns to Earth tomorrow, his priority is going to be organizing a boycott of Target stores? You think he’s going to appear on Fox to say, ‘Worry about genocide and hunger later – first, let’s battle with liberals over what holiday greeting to use’?”

Nicholas Kristof channeling St. Peter in a conversation with President Bush