Clever turns of phrase, special splashes of wit, provocative insight — all in a sentence or two.
“If I ever become Dictator of the World, my first edict is going to be a ban on allowing press releases to fall into the hands of the press. When the media get ahold of something stupid, there’s no telling what might happen.”
Functional Ambivalent in a great post on Christmas, Wal-Mart, religious protesters and stupidity. Mostly the latter.
“Or Ann Coulter, the right-wing bully who seems too loud even when you mute the television.”
Deborah Solomon in a New York Times Magazine about Lynne Truss, author of Eats, Shoots & Leaves and Talk to the Hand.
“Imagine if there’d been some sort of hideous Pentagon mess-up and someone had decided that the Army would go into battle driving a fleet of Camrys. . . . So why in the name of all that’s holy is it somehow acceptable to cruise down to the mall in a military vehicle?”
Richard Porter, author of Crap Cars, regarding the Hummer H1, quoted in a review by Roy Blount Jr.
Also included is Porter’s advice on the Geo Metro Convertible: “Don’t buy a car that’s smaller, and indeed less comfortable, than your shoes.”
“Woodward, Miller, Time magazine’s Matthew Cooper and NBC’s Tim Russert are less tragic figures in a grand journalistic drama than they are sad — but willing — bit players in somebody else’s rather sorry little charade.”
Tim Rutten in the Los Angeles Times. The sorry little charade is the “Bush administration’s efforts at press manipulation.”
“Unfortunately, calling him a coward was not enough. It gained us nothing but America’s hatred. You should have done more. You should have sent your flying monkeys to knock him down, take the stuffing out of him, and light it on fire.”
Jesus’ General letter to Rep. Jean Schmidt. On the House floor Ms. Schmidt said. “He also asked me to send Congressman Murtha a message: that cowards cut and run, Marines never do.”
Murtha is a decorated Marine veteran.
“The only U.S.-produced items that I can think of that exist in large quantities in China are dollar bills.”
Matthew Crabbe, the managing director of Access Asia Ltd., a market research firm, in an article in The New York Times on the struggle facing American brands in China compared “to European brands and even some Chinese brands.”
“The United States is buying $6 worth of goods from China for every $1 worth of goods it ships to China.”
A couple of other indicators from the same article:
G.M. has started building the Cadillac CTS sedan and Cadillac SRX car-based utility vehicle for the Chinese market in a 50-50 joint venture in Shanghai with the Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation.
Caterpillar, based in Peoria, Ill., has been one of the most successful American companies in the Chinese market, but now relies heavily on factories in China to supply the market.
“I like guys who got five deferments and (have) never been there and send people to war, and then don’t like to hear suggestions about what needs to be done.”
Representative John Murtha, referring to Vice President Dick Cheney. Murtha is a retired Marine colonel who was awarded a Bronze Star, two Purple Hearts and the Vietnamese Cross for Gallantry.
“What kind of priorities does our world have when Terrell Owens gets fired but Dick Cheney stays?”
NewMexiKen
“[Bush is] spending eight days in the Orient. After all he’s spent the past four years in disorient.”
David Letterman
“I am a marvelous housekeeper. Every time I leave a man I keep his house.”
Zsa Zsa Gabor quoted at One Good Thing.
“[A] turkey raised more carefully than a Montessori student….”
Kim Severson in The New York Times.
“To question your government is not unpatriotic — to not question your government is unpatriotic.”
Senator Chuck Hagel (R-Neb) quoted in The Washington Post
Also qualifies for “Best double negative of the day, so far.”
“When asked by an anthropologist what the Indians called America before the white man came, an Indian said simply, ‘Ours.'”
Vine Deloria Jr., who died Sunday
“The CIA is investigating who leaked the story that they have secret prisons in Europe. They are furious and say if they find the person who did it, they will send them to a secret prison Europe.”
— Jay Leno
“[A] member not so much of the Old School, as of the school they knocked down when the Old School was built.”
— Quoted in The New York Times from the Sunday Telegraph referring to George MacDonald Fraser, author of the Flashman series, the 12th volume of which is just out.
“You might expect me to object to the 2 1/2 -ton Jeep Commander Limited 4×4 on the grounds of its in-the-teens fuel economy. You would be wrong. I wouldn’t drive this thing if gas were free and I got 72 virgins with every fill-up.”
— Dan Neil, Los Angeles Times, who also has this:
“The purpose of the Commander — based on the Grand Cherokee platform — is to give Jeep a seven-passenger vehicle, two more seats than the Grand Cherokee. Which raises the question: Who are these two additional people and what did they ever do to Jeep? The third-row seats, reached after a brief spelunker behind the folded second-row seats and onto the hump of the rear axle, are hilariously cramped and uncomfortable.”
“Four billion years of evolution has apparently resulted in a creature that, at least in Pennsylvania, knows the difference between science and religion.”
“No, No, No, No, No, No, No, No”
— Los Angeles Times referring to the defeat of all eight California statewide propositions in Tuesday’s voting
“Helen is living proof that you can fuck your brains out.”
— Idaho GOP political operative regarding three-term Congresswoman Helen Chenoweth, widely regarded as “dumb as a mud fence.” Ms. Chenoweth had a considerable reputation.
Via the always insightful Jesus’ General.
“A recently discovered strain of custard could cause a worldwide flandemic, Centers For Dessert Control warned Monday.”
“It’s appalling to see ringleaders of the incompetent, mendacious crew who rushed into Iraq but not New Orleans getting big promotions and posh consulting jobs.”
“Months after the naked procession, a poll found that many of those getting most of their news from Fox believed that the emperor had in fact been clothed.”
“Would someone please give him a blow job so we can impeach him?”
— Sign reported by Andrew Tobias
“As Mo Udall once put it, the people have spoken, goddamn them.”
— Charles Pierce
According to CBS News, “President Bush’s job approval has reached the lowest level yet. Only 35 percent approve of the job he’s doing.”
And, to paraphrase Saturday Night Live, that’s the same 35% that believe Adam and Eve rode to church on dinosaurs.