This Week In Quotes: Oct 30 – Nov 05

06 Nov, 2009 by John Hawkins

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“We (the United States) tax everything that moves and doesn’t move, and that’s not what we see in Pakistan.” — Hillary Clinton

Maybe the greatest thing about human beings is if you show us the most desolate, horrible place on Earth, at least one of us will scratch his chin and say, “I bet land is really cheap there.” Boom, a month later, there are apartments and a Waffle House. — S. Peter Davis

“He’s gonna join the country, and not the club.” — Jim DeMint on Chuck DeVore

Many of the GOP’s boneheaded mistakes come from exactly the same source as the Democrats’ boneheaded mistakes: the tendency to believe the media action line about themselves. This produces arrogance in the Democrats, while the Republicans are like awkward, lovestruck teenagers – terrified the slightest bit of confident self-expression will blow their chances with the cute moderate in the pink sweater seated beside them in homeroom class. They suffer beneath the same irony that crushes every awkward teenager, since confident self-expression is exactly what is needed to connect with the object of their affections…assuming they’re not obsessing over someone they never had a chance with anyway. — Dr. Zero

The radical nature of the current Administration makes the idea of “moderate” compromise laughable. What’s the moderate position on freedom-crushing trillion-dollar health care and environmentalist legislation? They’re okay, as long as the Democrats pinky-swear to keep the cost under $800 billion? That’s the kind of promise no politician could keep, even if it was made in earnest. A moderate Republican is someone who lives in a state of perpetual surprise as he ponders the monthly bills for nanny-state government. What’s the point of electing people who are guaranteed to spend the rest of their political careers complaining about how they’ve been played for fools? — Dr. Zero

“We’ve got this giant big tent out there built on the advice of the media, but no one’s in it.” — Rush Limbaugh on the GOP

“By an incredible 61% to 14% margin, more people believe scientists will discover life in outer space than believe the current healthcare plan won’t add a penny to the deficit.” — Frank Luntz

Four Marines died, 11 others were wounded. I was certain I was going to be among the dead. People say your life passes before you. For me, I saw the people who meant the most to me. My mom. My dad. I was only semiconscious. Then, my girlfriend Diana’s face popped into my head. I was thinking, These are my last thoughts. She is my last thought. And I focused on her face, because if I was going to die in war, I wanted to die with the thought of something worth fighting for, something worth dying for. — Aaron Mankin

The Republican party is not a church. It does not promulgate doctrine and then exclude those who fail to share it. But political parties must stand for something, or they will be unable to generate enthusiastic support from the volunteers needed to burn shoe leather and calories winning competitive elections. — Ralph Reed

The idea that the government of a major advanced country would default on its debt — that is, tell lenders that it won’t repay them all they’re owed — was, until recently, a preposterous proposition. Argentina and Russia have stiffed their creditors, but surely the likes of the United States, Japan or Britain wouldn’t. Well, it’s still a very, very long shot, but it’s no longer entirely unimaginable. Governments of rich countries are borrowing so much that it’s conceivable that one day the twin assumptions underlying their burgeoning debt (that lenders will continue to lend and that governments will continue to pay) might collapse. — Robert Samuelson

There is a fundamental difference between reducing costs and simply shifting costs around, like a pea in a shell game at a carnival. Costs are not reduced simply because you pay less at a doctor’s office and more in taxes– or more in insurance premiums, or more in higher prices for other goods and services that you buy, because the government has put the costs on businesses that pass those costs on to you. — Thomas Sowell

“…(Republican) Candidates who live in moderate to slightly liberal districts have got to walk a little bit carefully here, because you do not want to put yourself in a position where you’re crossing that line on conservative principles, fiscal principles, because we’ll come after you. You’re gonna find yourself in a very tough hole if you’re arguing for the president’s stimulus plan or Nancy Pelosi’s health plan. There’s no justification for growing the size of government the way this administration and this Congress wants to do it.” — Michael Steele

CNN and Co. cut away to Balloon Boy in the middle of a live broadcast of the current president, one Barack Obama, talking, as is his wont. So let’s see: the whole of America goes bananas, mesmerized by a hot air balloon soaring into the stratosphere before coming down to earth and being revealed to be entirely empty. And you think it’s a metaphor for the first Bush term? It’s no wonder the New York Times is junk stock and laying off journalists faster than at any time in its history. — Mark Steyn