Wait, What?

Before Obama came along, we didn't have any successful radical Islamic terrorist attacks inside the United States.

-- Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, at an event for Donald Trump in Ohio, 15 August 2016

Closed Doors

It's hugely disappointing.  A trial is the one place where the system really gets tested.  Everything else is done behind closed doors.

-- Judge Jed S. Rakoff, a 20-year veteran of the Manhattan federal bench, on the sharp decline of jury trials, New York Times, 8 August 2016

Very Truly Yours

As Director of the Public Defender System, I can only hire attorneys when I have the funding to do so. ...  To avoid having to close one or more offices, the remaining option is to consider the use of Section 600.042.5, which gives the Director of the Public Defender System the authority to "[d]elegate the legal representation of any person to any member of the state bar of Missouri." ....

[P]ursuant to Section 600.0425 and as Director of the Missouri State Public Defender System tasked with carrying out the State's obligation to ensure that poor people who face incarceration are afforded competent counsel in their defense, I hereby appoint you, Jeremiah W. (Jay) Nixon, Bar No. 29603, to enter your appearance as counsel of record in the attached case.

Very truly yours,

-- Michael Barrett, Director of the Missouri Public Defender System, in a letter assigning a case to Governor Jay Nixon, 2 August 2016

Refugee Olympic Team

Madam Tegla gives us a chance for other people to know the history of our lives.  And we can forget what happened before.

-- Yiech Pur Biel, 21, an 800-meter runner who fled his village in South Sudan in 2005, on Tegla Loroupe, a Kenyan marathoner who is leading a group of 10 displaced athletes, known as the Refugee Olympic Team, to Rio, New York Times, 5 August 2016

Life Doesn't Suck

Very occasionally, if you really pay attention, life doesn't suck.

-- Joseph "Joss" Hill Whedon (23 June 1964 -), American screenwriter, film and television director and producer, Liner notes to the cast album Once More, with Feeling (2002)

Lost Track

Anyone who has lost track of time when using a computer knows the propensity to dream, the urge to make dreams come true, and the tendency to miss lunch.

-- Tim Berners-Lee (1955-), Inventor of the World Wide Web and director of the World Wide Web Consortium, interview by Kris Herbst for Internet World (June 1994)

Completely Different

I've also learned that my memory may be completely different than reality.  I've decided that my brain did that for a good reason (perhaps survival of that moment) or maybe it's just being an asshole again.  In either case, it's made me more humble and less insistent that I'm correct.  I've also put less weight on the past.  There's nothing I can do about it, except learn from it.  And I feel like I can learn no matter how I might mis-remember my alternate universe self, so I care less about what really happened.

-- Wendy, July 2016, http://wendria.blogspot.com/

Another First

And so it is with humility ... determination ... and boundless confidence in America's promise ... that I accept your nomination for President of the United States!

-- Hillary Clinton in her speech at the Democratic National Convention, becoming the first woman at the top of a major party ticket, 28 July 2016

More Yesterdays

Those of us who have more yesterdays than tomorrows tend to care more about our children and grandchildren.

-- Former President Bill Clinton in a speech at the Democratic National Convention, 27 July 2016, echoing a phrase he used on his 50th birthday, 19 August 1996

Quiet

There's nothing like a quiet ball park on the road.

-- Baseball announcer Tim McCarver, as the Cardinals tied the New York Mets 4-4 in the 9th inning at New York, 27 July 2016

Every Morning

I wake up every morning in a house that was built by slaves -- and I watch my daughters -- two beautiful, intelligent, black young women -- playing with their dogs on the White House lawn.  And because of Hillary Clinton, my daughters -- and all our sons and daughters -- now take for granted that a woman can be President of the United States.

-- First Lady Michelle Obama in a speech at the Democratic National Convention, 25 July 2016

Humbly And Gratefully

Friends, delegates and fellow Americans: I humbly and gratefully accept your nomination for the presidency of the United States.

-- Donald Trump, accepting the Republican nomination for president of the United States, 21 July 2016

Vote Your Conscience

We deserve leaders who stand for principle, who unite us all behind shared values, who cast aside anger for love.  That is the standard we should expect from everybody.  And, to those listening, please don't stay home in November. 

If you love our country, and love our children as much as you do, stand, and speak, and vote your conscience, vote for candidates up and down the ticket who you trust to defend our freedom, and to be faithful to the constitution. 

-- Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX), speaking at the Republican National Convention, 20 July 2016

The Real Damage

The real damage from terrorist attacks doesn't come from the explosion.  The real damage is done after the explosion, by the victims, who repeatedly and determinedly attack themselves, giving over reason in favor of terror.  Every London cop who stops someone from taking a picture of a public building, every TSA agent who takes away your kid's toothpaste, every NSA spook who wiretaps your email, does the terrorist's job for him.  Terrorism is about magnifying one mediagenic act of violence into one hundred billion acts of terrorized authoritarian idiocy.      

-- Cory Doctorow (1971-), Canadian-British blogger, journalist, and science fiction author, "BBC photographer prevented from shooting St Paul's because he might be 'al Qaeda operative'", 30 November 2009

Rough Year

It's been a rough year for the media experts.  It must be humbling to be so wrong about so much for so long.

-- Willie Robertson, star of A&E's "Duck Dynasty" at the Republican National Convention, 18 July 2016

A Rocket

If you take all the machinery in the world and dump it in the ocean, within months more than half of all humanity will die and within another six months they’d almost all be gone; if you took all the politicians in the world, put them in a rocket, and sent them to the moon, everyone would get along fine.      

-- Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983), American philosopher and systems theorist, Norie Huddle interview (1981)

We Cannot Let Terrorists Decide

You're speaking with, at one side a very happy man, and at the other a very sad man.  It's a very sad day I woke up to the terrible news from Nice, and it was a very just question as to whether we should race, but I think it was a just decision to race today.  I think we cannot let terrorists decide our lives in our society.

-- Tom Dumoulin, after claiming his second stage win at this year’s Tour de France, 15 July 2016

Crazy Ideas

Mostly, the most crazy ideas work the best.

-- Sjoerd Hoogendoorn, a security consultant who originated a program in the Netherlands of training eagles to intercept small drones midair, New York Times, 29 May 2016

Political Issues

All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred, and schizophrenia.      

-- George Orwell (1903-1950), pen name of British novelist Eric Arthur Blair, "Politics and the English Language" (1946)

Everything

There must be more to life than having everything!

-- Maurice Sendak (1928-2012), American writer and illustrator of children's literature,  Higglety Pigglety Pop! or, There Must Be More to Life (1967)

Super Duper

So it'd be super-duper if the death threats could stop.

-- Urbana, IL resident Bryton Mellott, on Facebook, after he earlier posted photos of himself burning a US flag with the hashtag #ArrestMe, for which he was arrested and quickly released, 4 July 2016, 1:12am

The Opposite

The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference.  The opposite of beauty is not ugliness, it's indifference.  The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference.  And the opposite of life is not death, but indifference between life and death.

-- Elie Wiesel (30 September 1928 – 2 July 2016), writer, professor at Boston University, political activist, Nobel Laureate and Holocaust survivor, US News & World Report (27 October 1986)

Fixed Star

Freedom to differ is not limited to things that do not matter much.  That would be a mere shadow of freedom. The test of its substance is the right to differ as to things that touch the heart of the existing order.  If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion or other matters of opinion.

-- Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson, writing for the majority in West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnette (319 U.S. 624), ruling that public school children could not be compelled to salute the U.S. flag (1943)

No Charges

[N]o charges are appropriate in this case.

-- FBI Director James Comey, announcing the conclusion of an FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server, 5 July 2016

The World Isn't Fair

The world isn't fair, but as long as it's tilting in my direction I find that there's a natural cap to my righteous indignation.

-- Scott Adams (1957-), American cartoonist and satirist, most famous for his Dilbert series of comic strips and books, in The Dilbert blog, The Benefits of Getting Old, 22 August 2006

Harder To Take

It is harder to take someone's eyeball than someone's user ID and password.

-- Steve Ellis, who helped develop eye scan technology for Wells Fargo, on the need to move away from personal identification information because of the growing number of data breaches, New York Times, 22 June 2016

A Good Lawyer

The earth needs a good lawyer.

-- Tag line at earthjustice.org, a nonprofit environmental law organization

Determined

Today on behalf of the 27 leaders, I can say that we are determined to keep our unity as 27.

-- European Union President Donald Tusk, reacting to the Brexit vote in the United Kingdom to leave the European Union, 24 June 2016

Ring Tones

Do we assign cell phone ring tones to our kids based upon what we perceive their personalities to be, or do their personalities evolve to fit the ring tones we assign them?

-- Ray Spooner, Bubbles, 31 May 2016

 https://rayslittleride.com/2016/05/31/bubbles/

A Trip Takes Us

A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike.  And all plans, safeguards, policing, and coercion are fruitless.  We find after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us.

-- John Ernst Steinbeck III (1902 – 1968), American writer, 1962 Nobel Laureate in Literature, Travels with Charley: In Search of America (1962), p 4

Double Dipping

Tomorrow is a double big day for me.  At 9:00 AM I get my 37th and final radiation treatment.  W00t!

And at 11:00 AM I get on the bus for 12 days in Europe.  My "trvth" notes will therefore take a 2-week hiatus.  See you on the funway!

Inclusive, Thoughtful, And Principled

As the Presidential campaign progressed, I was hoping the rhetoric would tone down and reflect a campaign that was inclusive, thoughtful and principled.  While I oppose the Democratic nominee, Donald Trump's latest statements, in context with past attacks on Hispanics, women and the disabled like me, make it certain that I cannot and will not support my party's nominee for President regardless of the political impact on my candidacy or the Republican Party.

-- Senator Mark Kirk (R-IL) in a press release, 7 June 2016

https://kirkforsenate.com/news/senator-kirk-statement-presidential-race/

A Total Eclipse

Clay comes out to meet Liston and Liston starts to retreat,
if Liston goes back an inch farther he'll end up in a ringside seat.
Clay swings with his left, Clay swings with his right,
Look at young Cassius carry the fight
Liston keeps backing, but there's not enough room,
It's a matter of time till Clay lowers the boom.
Now Clay lands with a right, what a beautiful swing,
And the punch raises the Bear clean out of the ring.
Liston is still rising and the ref wears a frown,
For he can't start counting till Sonny goes down.
Now Liston is disappearing from view, the crowd is going frantic,
But radar stations have picked him up, somewhere over the Atlantic.
Who would have thought when they came to the fight?
That they'd witness the launching of a human satellite.
Yes the crowd did not dream, when they put up the money,
That they would see a total eclipse of the Sonny.

-- Muhammad Ali (born Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr., 17 January 1942 - 3 June 2016), American boxer and Heavyweight Champion of the World three times between 1964 and 1979, in a poem composed prior to his 1964 match with Sonny Liston, as quoted in "Brash Clay waxed poetic in 1963 visit to Nashville" by Bill Traughber in Nashville's The City Paper (4 June 2002)

Noise And Impudence

There are seasons in every country when noise and impudence pass current for worth; and in popular commotions especially, the clamors of interested and factious men are often mistaken for patriotism.

-- Alexander Hamilton (1755 or 1757 – 1804), Founding Father of the United States, first Secretary of the Treasury (under President George Washington), founder of U.S. financial system, Father of the US Coast Guard, and founder of The New York Post

Vote For The Meteor

It's kind of like two football teams and you want both of them to lose.  Maybe a meteor will hit the stadium.  This is the opportunity for the American people to vote for the meteor.

-- Libertarian Party Chairman Nicholas Sarwark on the role of his party, at their convention in Orlando, Florida, 30 May 2016

You Can Do It With Either Hand

I made a fist of my right hand -- you can do it with either hand, by the way -- and put my arms around her.

-- Dr Henry J Heimlich, 96, on using the Heimlich maneuver to save an 87-year-old woman who was choking at their senior residence community in Cincinnati, New York Times, 28 May 2016

Perspective

A change in perspective is worth 80 IQ points.

-- Alan Kay (17 May 1940 -), computer scientist

Not Equal

All opinions are not equal. Some are a very great deal more robust, sophisticated and well supported in logic and argument than others.

-- Douglas Adams (1952 - 2001), English author and satirist, The Salmon of Doubt (2002)

Right At The Top

The higher up you go, the more mistakes you are allowed. Right at the top, if you make enough of them, it's considered to be your style.

-- Fred Astaire (1899-1987), dancer, actor, singer, musician, and choreographer, in The Notorious Landlady, written by Blake Edwards and Larry Gelbart (1962)

RIP Morley Safer

It makes me uneasy.  It is not natural to be talking to a piece of machinery.  But the money is very good.

-- Morley Safer (8 November 1931 - 19 May 2016), CBS television correspondent and mainstay of the network's newsmagazine "60 Minutes" for almost five decades, in a recent interview

Faced With The Prospect

Obituaries & In Memoriam

NOLAND, MARY ANNE

NOLAND, Mary Anne Alfriend.  Faced with the prospect of voting for either Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton, Mary Anne Noland of Richmond chose, instead, to pass into the eternal love of God on Sunday, May 15, 2016

-- Richmond Times-Dispatch, Richmond, VA, 17 May 2016


http://www.richmond.com/obituaries/article_c21b60bc-1153-5abd-b3c8-268cfd32eb57.html

The Last Thing

The last thing a parent teaches a child is how to die.

-- John DeVore, The Moth podcast, May 2016

All Will Be Lost

We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost.

-- Sir Charles Spencer "Charlie" Chaplin, KBE (1889-1977), English comic actor and filmmaker, in The Great Dictator (1940)

Easier Than You Think

It's far easier than you think to manipulate a nation of naive, self-absorbed sheep who crave instant gratification.

-- Anonymous Congressman X, allegedly a sitting congressman, in The Confessions of Congressman X (2016)

Because America

We are embarking on what should be the most patriotic summer that this generation has ever seen, with Copa America Centenario being held on U.S. soil for the first time, Team USA competing at the Rio 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

-- Budweiser Vice President Ricardo Marques, announcing that Budweiser is renaming its beer "America" through the presidential election in November, 9 May 2013

A Londoner

I'm a Londoner, I'm European, I'm British, I'm English, I'm of Islamic faith, of Asian origin, of Pakistani heritage, a dad, a husband.

-- Newly-elected London Mayor Sadiq Khan, New York Times, 30 April 2016

It Will Take Them

There are certainly areas within the city which have not been burned, but this fire will look for them, and it will take them.

-- Darby Allen, a regional fire chief in Alberta, Canada, on a rampaging wildfire that forced the evacuation of all 88,000 residents of Fort McMurray, Canada, New York Times, 5 May 2016

The Years Thunder By

The years thunder by,
    The dreams of youth grow dim where they lie
caked in dust on the shelves of patience.
    Before we know it, the tomb is sealed.      

-- Sterling Hayden (1916 - 1986), American actor, writer and seaman, Wanderer (1963) Book I: Man at Bay, Ch. 5

My Results

I have had my results for a long time: but I do not yet know how I am to arrive at them.      

-- Carl Friedrich Gauss (1777-1855), German mathematician, astronomer, and physicist, quoted in The Mind and the Eye (1954) by A. Arber

Obama Out

And with that I just have two more words to say: Obama out.

-- President Barack Obama ending his final White House Correspondents' Dinner with a mic drop, 30 April 2016