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