I’ve met foreign leaders who can’t go out and say this publicly, but boy they look at you and say, ‘You’ve got to win this, you’ve got to beat this guy, we need a new policy,’ things like that. — John Kerry ‘In terms of who he’s talked to, we’re not going to discuss that,’ spokeswoman Stephanie Cutter said yesterday. ‘I know it would be helpful, but we’re not going into that. His counsels are kept private.’ — The Washington Times, “Kerry fails to back up foreign ‘endorsements’” Read more →
Author Archive: Paul Epps
A Brief History of Democratic Statesmanship
Speaking at Columbia University in 1959, a student challenged the 33rd President [Harry Truman], a Democrat, on dropping the second A-bomb. ‘The reason I asked this,’ the student said, ‘was that it seemed to me the second bomb came pretty soon after the first one.’ After speaking testily of ‘Monday morning quarterbacks,’ Truman said simply: ‘I was there. I did it. I would do it again.’ — Daniel Henninger, The Wall Street Journal KERRY: I think George Bush rushed to war without exhausting the remedies available to him, without exhausting the diplomacy necessary to put the U.S. in the strongest position possible, without pulling together the logistics and the plan to shore up Iraq immediately and effectively. TIME: And you as Commander in Chief would not have made these mistakes but would have gone to war? KERRY: I didn’t say that. TIME: I’m asking. KERRY: I can’t tell you. —… Read more →
Mother and Son
“Do you ever listen to me?” “What?” Read more →
I’d Like to Buy a Bowel II
Proving that looks are not always deceiving, here’s a photo of the gentlemen accused in the UCLA grave robbing scandal. Read more →
Mr. October
Henry Aaron never hit 50 [home runs] in a season . . . Bonds hit 73 [in 2001], and he would have hit 100 if they would have pitched to him. I mean, come on, now. There is no way you can outperform Aaron and Ruth and Mays at that level. — Reggie Jackson, expressing his view that “somebody definitely is guilty of using steroids.” Read more →
Zelda Fitzgerald
Nobody has ever measured, even the poets, how much a heart can hold. . . . When one really can’t stand anymore, the limits are transgressed, and one thing has become another; poetry registers itself on the hospital charts, and heart-break has to be taken care of. — Zelda Fitzgerald On this date in 1948, she and eight other patients died in a fire at the Highland Mental Hospital in Asheville, NC. Because they had been locked in their rooms for the night, the patients were unable to escape the flames. Read more →
Song Lyrics That Didn’t Resonate Till Years Later
Living is easy with eyes closed Misunderstanding all you see It’s getting hard to be someone but it all works out It doesn’t matter much to me. — Lennon and McCartney, “Strawberry Fields Forever” Read more →
Better Look Again
20 Alleged Illegal Immigrants Found in LA — Associated Press I would have guessed there were a lot more than that . . . Read more →
Foreigners for Kerry
I’ve met foreign leaders who can’t go out and say this publicly, but boy they look at you and say, ‘You’ve got to win this, you’ve got to beat this guy, we need a new policy,’ things like that. — John Kerry SEOUL — North Korea’s state-controlled media is known for its reverential reporting on Mr Kim Jong-il. But the Dear Leader is not the only one getting deferential treatment: Mr John Kerry, the presumptive Democratic candidate in the United States, is also getting good play in Pyongyang. His speeches are being broadcast on Radio Pyongyang and reported in glowing terms by the Korea Central News Agency (KCNA). — “Kerry gets dream run in North Korean media”, The Straits Times Read more →
Quotes on Kerry
Yet not all Democrats are thrilled with John Kerry. (As an aside, try to wrap your mind around the phrase ‘thrilled with John Kerry’ and you’ll see why he might not be the strongest nominee.) — Best of the Web Today I have never met anybody, nor seen anybody interviewed, nor received an email from anybody, nor read a letter to a newspaper from anybody who really woke up in the morning and thought: If John Kerry doesn’t win, I just don’t know what I shall do. — Christopher Hitchens, The Daily Mirror Read more →
Kids in America
The woman cutting my hair today tells me her son’s favorite things to watch are horror movies — he really likes The Evil Dead — and The Simpsons. Did I mention that her son is 4-1/2 years old? Read more →
You’ve Got a Problem
You know you’ve got a problem when: You take your stroller-age child to an amusement park and you’re buying a beer at 11:30 in the morning; or You are the stroller-age child. I was at California Adventure yesterday and I saw this happening over and over . . . Read more →
I’d Like to Buy a Bowel
Sale of Body Parts at UCLA Alleged — Los Angeles Times Read more →
Today’s Text
Time passes. Listen. Time passes. . . . — Dylan Thomas, Under Milk Wood Read more →
Happy Birthday, Spam
On this date in 1994, a message was posted to some Usenet newsgroups by the law firm of Canter and Siegel, advertising its services for the Green Card lottery. Others soon followed in the footsteps of Canter and Siegel, torpedoing the usefulness of newsgroups with junk messages, which eventually spread from Usenet to email. According to Brightmail, most email is now spam. Read more →
Come On!
The Kumon (pronounced KOO-mon) learning centers are very popular here in Irvine, where parents are always looking for ways to give their kids a one-up on somebody else’s kids . . . Read more →
The Noble Pug
The pug is among the oldest breeds of dog. It is believed to have originated in China before 400 B.C., and is known to have been a pet in Buddhist monasteries in Tibet. The pug made the long trek to Europe with 17th-century traders of the Dutch East India Company. I bet they had their heads out the window the whole way! Famous pug owners include the Empress Josephine, and the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. Read more →
We Need to Know the Truth
Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., the front-runner for the Democratic nomination for president, said he thought there ought to be some investigation of the claim that Aristide was forced out and escorted by U.S. troops. ‘I have a very close friend in Massachusetts who talked directly to people who have made that allegation,’ Kerry said on Today on NBC. ‘I don’t know the truth of it. I really don’t. But I think it needs to be explored and we need to know the truth of what happened.’ — “U.S. denies Aristide’s kidnap charges,” Newsday This has become standard operating procedure for Democrats: put out some outlandish statement (President Bush had foreknowledge of Sept. 11, Bush was a ‘deserter’), then say you ‘don’t know the truth of it’ but it’s ‘out there’ and ‘we need to know’ what happened. — Best of the Web Today Read more →
Stop the Presses
Black Voters Align With Democrats Against Bush — Washington Post Read more →
French Marines
From a Wall Street Journal article on the arrival of French troops in Haiti: U.S. Marines set up a security perimeter at the airport, kneeling in the grass as about 80 French Marines arrived in C-160 transport planes. The French Marines’ supplies included crates of bottled Evian water. Read more →