The Best of Notable Quotables; December 16, 1996
Table of Contents:
- The Best of Notable Quotables; December 16, 1996
- Craig Livingstone Award
- Freddy Krueger Award
- Chris Dodd Talking Points
- Good Morning Morons
- Until Every Child is Dead
- Politics of Meaninglessness
- Blaming Reagan
- I Am Woman
- Fear of the Competition
- Al Gore Tax Cut Scheme
- Damn Conservatives
- Which Way Is It?
- Media Hero
- Timothy McVeigh Award
- Bryant Gumbel Award
- If the Bias Fits Award
- What's the Frequency
- Quote of the Year
- 1996 Award Judges
Fear of the Competition Award (for Impugning Talk Radio)
NBC's Bryant Gumbel: "You mention talk radio. They [relatives of
Oklahoma bombing victims] have some very hard feelings about talk
radio and the hate being spewed by some of those on the far end
of the spectrum."
Bill Moyers: "If anything, talk radio in that part of the world
is more anti-government today than ever. The airwaves are
saturated with hostility, it's just an unremitting vilification
of government. Sometimes it's, sometimes it's, you know, the
government makes mistakes and there are justifiable grievances
against government. But this is, this goes beyond that, it's
excessive. And these people take it like salt in the wound. They
drive around, they turn on their radio, they hear some vicious
attack on government, and they think, `You know, if you strike
the government, you kill my daughter.'"
-- Bill Moyers on the April 12 Today promoting that night's Dateline on the families of and victims of the Oklahoma City bombing. [105 points]
Runners-up
"Limbaugh's draft-avoiding,
non-churchgoing, non-voting, non- fact-checking, painfully insecure
triple-wife lifestyle all are topics delicately touched upon by
Franken. Where I think he really hits the jackpot, though, is when he
actually quotes Limbaugh directly as in: ...`I'm sick and tired of
playing theone phony game I've had to play and that is this so-called
compassion for the poor. I don't have compassion for the poor.'
He may not have cancer, either, and I would pray that he never
have to walk that particular path of pain: Yet who am I to say,
or how can any of us know, the ways of God in unlocking a heart
grown hard? It could happen more gently; I notice a couple of
weeks ago, for instance, they shut down that `Rush Room' at
Blackie's House of Beef. Limbaugh `is fading right now' in
popularity among the restaurant's patrons, according to catering
manager Paul DeKoning. Is this a great country, or what?"
--Washington Post reporter Phil McCombs (whom Limbaugh ridiculed in
1994) on Saturday Night Live writer Al Franken's new book Rush
Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot and Other Observations, January 19
Style section. [64]
"When I heard the quote it sounded to me like it was Limbaugh or
Liddy or Ollie North. It was like wacko talk radio. It didn't
sound like Brinkley. In other words, Brinkley's always been
irreverent, but always kind of classy."
-- CNN's Larry King on David Brinkley's election night comments that Clinton is a "bore"and his speech delivered "more goddamn nonsense," November 7 Larry King Live. [57]
