Notable Quotables - 05/10/1993
NBC's Anita Hill Double Standard
"Were any of
Clarence Thomas' real qualifications ever examined?. ..Did the White House
package him and sell him to the public?... In your book, you say that the
White House organized women's groups to support Thomas and that that was
somehow manufactured. Can you tell us about that?"
- Questions from then-Sunday Today co-host Mary Alice Williams to
liberal Newsday reporter Timothy Phelps on his pro-Anita Hill book Capitol
Games, July 5, 1992.
"You do, though,
Mr. Brock, have some innate biases, don't you? I mean, The American
Spectator is an ultraconservative magazine. And it seems as if you are an
advocate for Justice Thomas in the book. Is it really fair to call yourself an
objective journalist?"
- Today co-host Katie Couric to American Spectator
contributor David Brock on his book The Real Anita Hill, May 3.
"Ever since the
Civil War...Americans have been reading a magazine called The Nation.
It's always been a platform for speakers who have been ahead of their time.
This morning, we'll look at a new book that reminds us how important that
platform has been."
- Then-reporter Katie Couric celebrating the far-left Nation
magazine's anniversary, October 22, 1990 Today.
Overenthused About Gay March Attendance
"The largest
demonstration in U.S. history is gathering now on the grounds that stretch
between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial. Gay and lesbian
Americans from around the nation have joined hands around the Capitol and laid
down a memorial to the victims of AIDS. They're here to step out of the closet
and onto the main stage of American history, today, Sunday, April 25th,
1993."
- Today co-host Scott Simon before any count of march attendance had
been taken. (The U.S. Park Police estimated 300,000, half the official
estimate of the 1969 Vietnam War moratorium.)
"Life and Death
puppets danced in the streets as an estimated one million lesbians, gays, and
supporters demonstrated about life and death issues....But for the most part,
this was a love-in that drew more than a million gay and lesbian peoples and
gave many of them chills of joy."
- WCAU-TV (Philadelphia) reporter Dennis Woltering on the CBS overnight news
show Up To The Minute, April 26.
Strait's Dynamic Democrats: Califano, Roberts, Shalala and Hillary
"She restores a
tradition of excellence at the Department of Health and Human Services. That
agency has been headed by some of America's truly great human beings: Joe
Califano, Pat Harris, and now Donna Shalala. She is an academic who is
connected with the real needs of people. When it comes to being an effective
advocate for those who have no voice, she has few equals, perhaps only one -
the other half of the dynamic duo here in Washington, that is the duo of Donna
Shalala and Hillary Rodham Clinton."
- ABC health reporter George Strait introducing Shalala to the National
Minority AIDS Council on C-SPAN, Apr. 22.
Clinton's Deficit-Cutting Courage
"Yesterday you came
out and said `Let's give the President an E for effort.' Shouldn't he get a
better grade for at least passing a budget that takes the deficit seriously
for the first time?"
- CBS This Morning co-host Harry Smith to Sen. Bob Dole, April 30.
"Great salesman
that he is, Clinton can be viewed as a victim of his own success. His
insistence on deficit reduction - and his cajoling of Congress to support a
multi-year plan to accomplish it - is the very definition of courage in
modern American politics."
- Time Chief Political Correspondent Michael Kramer, May 3.
Godlike Gorbachev
"What do you do for
an encore after ending the Cold War and reversing the arms race? That's the
latest assignment for Mikhail Gorbachev, having assumed the presidency of the
International Green Cross, a new environmental organization..."
- Time's "The Week" section, May 3.
Reagan Apologists Much Like Marxists
"We suffer, Hughes
claims, from a `hollowness at the cultural core, a retreat from public
responsibility,' and he is right; the alchemists of Commentary, refining their
elaborate and obsequious apologias for Reaganism, are at least as culpable as
the chic Marxists of the Modern Language Association, dancing their
politically correct minuets - and probably a lot more dangerous."
- Washington Post book critic Jonathan Yardley on Time art
critic Robert Hughes' book Culture of Complaint, April 4 "Book
World" section.
"For members of
Ronald Reagan's Administration, the metamorphosis has been traumatic. Just a
few years ago, they commanded Washington. They were privy and powerful,
setting the country's intellectual and moral compass. Their mission was called
noble. But after they left, their crusade was rejected, their ideology
repudiated much as the Russians have repudiated communism. They were accused
of making greed into the country's unofficial religion. Their fall was far and
fast and the crash was painful."
- Opening of New York Times reporter Lindsey Gruson's story on
conference of former Reagan officials, April 25.
Progress: Women in Insane Combat
"Les Aspin said
last week that he means to clear the way for women in the armed forces to
fight in combat. That is a milepost, of course, and an advance of considerable
importance to women... The least sane enterprise upon which human beings ever
embark will thus be made non-sexist. Women have always suffered the madness
and horror of war. Now at least they will do so with a gun in their hands.
It's a milepost and a great leap forward, to be sure."
- CBS Sunday Morning host Charles Kuralt, May 2.
Little Coverage of Reagan-Bush Scandal?
"Reporters need far
more education, especially on budgeting and finance. This weakness follows a
campaign in which there was little coverage of the scandals of the Reagan-Bush
administration - or, if there was a mention, there was included a denial or a
disclaimer. Often editors hid behind that old phrase `there is no proof' when
there was plenty of fire and smoke."
- White House reporter Sarah McClendon in Editor & Publisher,
April 3 issue.
Fast-Food-Quality Free Market Advice
"Some of the same economists whose belief in an undiluted free market seem to run to permitting many Americans to free fall into unemployment came to Moscow to tell President Yeltsin only shock therapy could snap Russia into prosperity....There's nothing wrong with having a McDonald's just off Red Square, (that McDonald's, incidentally, is Canadian), but for some Russians and Americans, it's beginning to characterize the quality of the over-the-counter economic advice we've been giving them - fast- fix assembly-line fast food that still leaves the store shelves empty.
"...The
opportunities for Americans in Russia should be something more than just the
last vast market for our most precious products or political theories. Helping
Russia to be free ought to mean helping the Russians to be free to find
another way."
- Weekend Today co-host Scott Simon, April 3.
Swinging at Reaganomics
"[Barry] Bonds
earning about $40,000 a game? How can the Giants afford that....This kind of
baseball economics makes as much sense as Ronald Reagan's promise to balance
the budget by cutting taxes and increasing defense spending."
- Time contributor and Esquire Washington bureau chief Walter
Shapiro, April 12 Time.
- L. Brent Bozell III;
Publisher
- Brent H. Baker, Tim Graham; Editors
- Andrew Gabron, Kristin Johnson, Steve Kaminski, Mark Rogers, Bill Thompson;
Media Analysts
- Kathleen Ruff, Circulation Manager;
- David Muska,; Interns
