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Lingua publica The
good and the bad...
web posted May 22, 2006
"[Illegal aliens] should not be given an automatic path to citizenship. This is amnesty, and I oppose it. Amnesty would be unfair to those who are here lawfully, and it would invite further waves of illegal immigration." -- U.S. President George W. Bush
"How many immigrants would the Senate's immigration plan allow into the U.S.?... Until now, the focus has been on the 10 million or so illegal aliens to whom the bill would give amnesty. But the bill would admit far more immigrants: 103 million -- or one-third the current U.S. population -- over the next 20 years." -- The Heritage Foundation
"Many people have fled radical Muslim regimes to live in the U.S. Hardly anyone has fled the U.S. to live under radical Muslim regimes." -- Arnold Kling
"Why do the same people who don't trust the government to spy on terrorists, lest dissenters get caught up in the web, so often also urge giving government control over our health care?" -- James Taranto
"To Democrats, no policy is more important than opposition to what President Bush is for, even if it's what Democrats said they were for yesterday." -- Jack Kelly
"[C]ome the November elections, the Republican Party may get exactly what it deserves from disgusted voters -- namely, a swift kick in the pants. Whereas, on [the other] hand, it is necessary to ask whether the voters deserve what they'd get by giving the Republicans what they deserve." -- William Murchison
"Proof that incumbent politicians are highly susceptible to corruption is the fact that the government they control is shot through with it. Yet [according to John McCain] that government should be regarded as a disinterested arbiter, untainted by politics and therefore qualified to regulate the content, quantity and timing of speech in campaigns that determine who controls the government." -- George Will
"I would rather have a clean government than one where quote 'First Amendment rights' are being respected that has become corrupt. If I had my choice, I'd rather have the clean government." -- John McCain
"All this makes me sick. Why should I defend myself against this rubbish?... If they can prove I have an account abroad...containing even one dollar I will resign my post." -- Cuban dictator Fidel Castro on a Forbes magazine report listing him as one of the world's wealthiest rulers
"It's certainly hard to imagine Pat Leahy as FDR or Harry Truman or any other warmongering Democrat of yore. To be sure, most of Pat's Vermont voters would say there is no war; it's just a lot of fear-mongering got up by Bush and Cheney to distract from the chads they stole in Florida or whatever." -- Mark Steyn
"The New York Times, always keeping a weather eye for new evidence that guns are dangerous, reported this week that men who handle guns get more stirred up than men who handle children's board games." -- Jonah Goldberg
"Apparently the American establishment has finally taken to heart the teaching of Karl Marx: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need. America should house and feed and educate and provide health care and employ all the world according to our ability. And surely the people of the world will provide the need. And why not? After all, it is just dumb luck that each of us finds ourselves in God-blessed America. Well, if we keep going at this rate we will soon run out of luck. But apparently we will never run out of dumb." -- Tony Blankley
"Iran's president Mahmud Ahmadi-Nejad wrote a letter Monday offering to fly to Washington, DC and negotiate. It's a trip he'll never forget. Dick Cheney will take him to the firing range, then Patrick Kennedy can drive him back to the embassy." -- Argus Hamilton
"The overwhelming majority of people exercised about immigration are not remotely racist, prejudiced, bigoted or nativist. They are, however, unapologetic patriots, believers in the American ideal, the American identity and the American culture. They are not slaves to an exclusively capitalistic perspective, realizing that economic considerations —pro and con—are only one part of the equation." -- David Limbaugh
web posted May 15, 2006
"Some people say it is 'name-calling' if you refer to someone as a liberal. There is nothing inherently negative about the word 'liberal.' If it has acquired negative overtones, that is because of what liberals have done and the consequences that followed." -- Thomas Sowell
"[President Bush's] compassionate conservatism [involves] a core faith that not only can the government love you, but it should spend money to prove its love. Beyond that, there seems to be no core set of principles that define Bush's approach." -- Jonah Goldberg
"Life is hard and sometimes terrible, and that is a tragedy. It explains much, but it is not a free pass." -- Peggy Noonan
"There is no such thing as 'price gouging' by private businesses. The term 'price gouging' implies that gas stations have an ability to forcibly inflict harm on us -- but they do not. Any price we pay for a gallon of gasoline -- whether $1 or $3 -- we pay voluntarily, based on the value of the gasoline to us." -- Alex Epstein
"If we want to knock down the price of $70+ crude oil, the best place to start would be by expanding our own production, not by running to regulators and government lawyers to investigate spurious charges of price gouging." -- Max Schultz
"When you think about rising gas prices the first thing to understand is that the people we expect to solve this problem -- the folks in Washington -- are the very people who do not want it solved. To ask politicians to do something about the skyrocketing cost of gasoline at the pump is like asking Osama bin Laden to do something to prevent terrorism." -- Michael Reagan
"Mere knowledge isn't enough. It never has been, and it never will be. What matters is what we do with what we know." -- Rebecca Hagelin
"One of the things that always made me feel good in the morning was waking up and realizing I did not belong to the same political party as Chuck Schumer. It made me feel clean -- even before I took a shower." -- Tony Blankley
"Helen Thomas has been called 'the dean of White House correspondents.' After some of her recent remarks, someone suggested that she should be called the Howard Dean of White House correspondents." -- Thomas Sowell
"I propose that we rename all of the 'African American' and 'Diversity' programs on college campuses in honor of their help in promoting racial paranoia on the university (and American) landscape. From now on, we could call them 'Woefully Hypocritical Initiatives for Never-Ending Racial Scapegoating.' Or...we could save time and ink by calling them WHINERS." -- Mike Adams
"[Patrick Kennedy] is 38, a year older than his father was when he drove Mary Jo Kopechne to her grave. Since then, Massachusetts voters have returned the elder Kennedy to the Senate six times. If the weird hypnotic power the Kennedys wield against Massachusetts voters extends south to Rhode Island, Patrick Kennedy may have a long political career ahead of him." -- James Taranto
"Congressman Patrick Kennedy announced he's entering rehab after crashing his car while sleep-driving on prescription medication. His family is there for him. For the next twenty-eight days he will occupy the Kennedy Chair at the Mayo Clinic." -- Argus Hamilton
"Hillary Clinton said that her childhood dream was to be an Olympic athlete. But
she was not athletic enough. She said she wanted to be an astronaut, but at the
time they didn't take women. She said she wanted to go into medicine, but
hospitals made her woozy. Should she be telling people this story? I mean she's
basically saying she wants to be president because she can't do anything else." -- Jay Leno
"What is happening to George W. Bush is that dissenters are moving from criticism of him to just plain hostility to him. Swings in the public mood that emphatic aren't unknown to American history, though these days they are more lacerating because of the diurnal polls that give lapidary attention to wisps of sentiment." -- William F. Buckley on George W. Bush's low polling numbers
"It may take a defeat in November for the GOP to unlearn the lessons of power... One gets the impression party leaders, deep in their hearts, believe the base is... base. Unsophisticated. Primitive. Obsessed with its little issues. They're trying to educate the base. But if history is a guide, the base is about to teach them a lesson instead." -- Peggy Noonan
web posted May 8, 2006
"Regarding the...pleasure of spending other people's money, many Senate Republicans adhere to Oscar Wilde's advice on how to deal with temptation: Succumb to it. That is how many conservative voters will respond to the growing temptation to boycott this November's elections." -- George Will
"According to the Tax Foundation, over the past 25 years -- in inflation adjusted dollars -- oil and gas companies have paid in royalties and state and federal taxes $2.2 trillion dollars. At the same time they have made a little over $630 billion dollars in profits. So their taxes and royalties are three times greater than their profits. The real question...is who is gouging whom?" -- Michael Reagan
"Why is it so difficult to tell people that if they want to see gas prices go down, they should reduce consumption? Some estimates I've seen indicate that cutting consumption by as little as 3 percent could lower prices. It's called supply and demand, but too many of us have been making too many demands, not only on petroleum, but also on politicians." -- Cal Thomas
"The bottom line is that while these demonstrations, I am told, are supposed to make me feel better about illegal immigrants, I feel angry when I see thousands of people who knowingly break American law, yet somehow feel entitled to do so and outraged that they have not been sufficiently rewarded for it." -- Debra Saunders
"As Congress debates 'ethics reform,' people should press them to end the earmarking process. The status quo simply can't continue... Besides the waste, there's the moral question: The job of government, the Bible tells us, is to preserve order and do justice. It's difficult to see how earmarking accomplishes either." -- Chuck Colson
"In Canada, they sing the anthem in...French and English. You know, I'm a patriot. I'm proud to have our anthem sung in any language possible. I don't care if you translate it into German. As long as people are singing the national anthem in the United States of America and being patriotic, I think, we ought to be pleased with that." -- Howard Dean on the Spanish version of the American national anthem
"I did not understand why members of Congress think I'm a criminal and want to deport me..." -- Angel Lopez, an illegal alien
"Nobody knows more about gas production than a senator, but there's a difference in 'gasbaggery' and 'refining gasoline'." -- Wesley Pruden
"John Kerry announced this week's John Kerry Iraq Policy of the Week the other day: 'Iraqi politicians should be told that they have until May 15 to deal with these intransigent issues and at last put together an effective unity government or we will immediately withdraw our military.' With a sulky pout perhaps? With hands on hips and a full flip of the hair? Did he get that from Churchill? 'We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender, at least until May 15, when I have a windsurfing engagement off Nantucket'." -- Mark Steyn
"The Gallup Poll last week asked Americans by region if they preferred to see the name Hillary Clinton or Hillary Rodham Clinton on the presidential ballot. The results were not surprising. In the North and Midwest it was Hillary Clinton, in the West it was Hillary Rodham Clinton, and in the South it was When Pigs Fly." -- Argus Hamilton
"When I talk to liberals, I don't expect them to understand my positions on various issues. I spend most of my time trying to help them understand their own." -- Mike Adams
"Mr. Moussaoui, you came here to be a martyr in a great big bang of glory, but...instead you will die with a whimper." -- Judge Leonie Brinkema to Zacarias Moussaoui, after the convicted terrorist shouted that he had won
web posted May 1, 2006
"I think sometimes incumbents forget that we're sent here to reform Washington. We're not sent here to be co-opted by Washington." -- Newt Gingrich
"Despite all the tax cuts that the federal government has passed recently, Americans will still spend more on taxes than they spend on food, clothing and housing combined." -- Tax Foundation President Scott Hodge
"Instead of averting an impending fiscal crisis, members of Congress are grabbing the spoils to support their own re-election." -- Citizens Against Government Waste President Tom Schatz
"It's not at all about who gets what vote, it's about continuing a system of laws that has allowed America to become, among many other things, a place immigrants want to come to. And it's about admitting immigrants in a coherent, orderly, legal manner, with an eye first to what America needs." -- Peggy Noonan
"Immigrants in past centuries came here to become Americans, not to remain foreigners, much less to proclaim the rights of their homelands to reclaim American soil, as some of the Mexican activist groups have done... Today, immigrant spokesmen promote grievances, not gratitude, much less patriotism." -- Thomas Sowell
"[W]e're all rotten sinners, incapable of redemption on our own. The liberal answer to sin is to say: I can never pay this back, so my argument will be I didn't do anything wrong." -- Ann Coulter
"[M]y real exercise, that truly keeps me fit, is to get on my knees each morning and each night and thank God for waking up in America, and to thank God for the men and women who wear the uniform in Iraq and Afghanistan and everywhere else they serve..." -- Ben Stein
"Mistakes are made in every war; there's a reason the word 'snafu' began as a military acronym whose meaning we can't reprint in a family newspaper." -- The Wall Street Journal
"[T]he Rev. Jesse Jackson...has been performing the same gig for so long, he's become a caricature of his caricature -- trying to keep the memory of slavery alive." -- Kathleen Parker
"Democrats actually think it's a virtue to make America more like France by spending taxpayer money like drunken sailors." -- Dan Clifton
"The Democrats need some adult supervision before they really end up damaging themselves." -- James Taranto
"Do you worry? You look like you do. Worrying is the way the responsible citizen of an advanced society demonstrates his virtue: He feels good by feeling bad. But what to worry about? Iranian nukes? Nah, that's just some racket cooked up by the Christian fundamentalist Bush and his Zionist buddies to give Halliburton a pretext to take over the Persian carpet industry." -- Mark Steyn
"In the Kennedy worldview, [gas] prices tend to be set not by market forces but by -- to employ the senator's word -- 'greed.' Evidently, the companies thought they could rob us blind without Ted Kennedy's noticing. Hah!" -- Bill Murchison
"First of all, the Democrats wailing and whining about the high [gas] prices have forgotten they are supposed to be friends of the Greens. Higher gas prices. Less driving. Less driving. Less greenhouse gasses. Why isn't Nancy Pelosi cheering high gasoline prices?... I went to a local grocery store and bought a bottle of water. 99 cents. 16.9 fluid ounces... [That equals] $7.50 per gallon. For water. Get me Nancy Pelosi on the phone." -- Rich Galen
"President Bush met with the President of China at the White House. The President
of China gave President Bush a traditional Chinese gift -- a pirated bootleg copy of "Mission Impossible 3" two weeks before it comes out" -- Jay Leno
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