Notable Quotables - 06/19/1995

 

That About Sums It Up

"President Clinton will outline his version of a plan he says will balance the federal budget in ten years without what Mr. Clinton sees as a radical and extremist Republican plan to gut programs that help the old, the young, and the poor in order to bankroll tax giveaways to the rich. Republicans, of course, see it a different way."
- Dan Rather before CBS News coverage of President Clinton's budget address, June 13.

"Tax reductions are just one area of disagreement. The President wants cuts for the middle class. The Republicans favor breaks for corporations and the wealthy. The GOP wants twice as much cut from Medicare, Medicaid, and welfare than the President."
- ABC News reporter Bill Greenwood on Good Morning America, June 14.

 

Oklahoma City: Blame the National Anthem

"In the post-Oklahoma City debate over the links between violent rhetoric and violent action, some social critics have begun looking beyond talk radio, focusing instead on the metaphors and imagery that have helped to define America from the earliest days of the Republic. What they conclude is that the disturbed and disgruntled - who have already made up their minds to kill or terrorize - can lean on a slew of cultural icons to legitimize their feelings of aggression. After all, these theorists say, the United States is a nation founded in rebellion and riddled with mottos, slogans and images grounded in battle and aggression. `Live free or die,' says the New Hampshire license plate. `With the sword we seek peace, but under liberty,' goes the less-known Massachusetts state motto. And what schoolchild cannot recite Patrick Henry's stirring words, `Give me liberty or give me death'? Whether consciously or not, a growing number of academics say, some homegrown terrorists and killers may warm themselves in the rhetorical glow of the rocket's red glare."
- Boston Globe reporter Anthony Flint beginning a front page story, June 1.

 

Good Morning, Bryant...and Hillary?

TV Guide: "Imagine NBC gives you a blank check and says, `Go find the person to put in the chair next to you.' Only one caveat: It can't be Katie or Jane....Come on, just for fun. A choice of three."
Bryant Gumbel: "Okay, here goes: my wife, June, to keep things peaceful at home. Oprah Winfrey, because she can do no wrong. And Hillary Clinton, just to tick off the right-wing extremists."
- From TV Guide's June 17 interview.

 

Republicans Will Make You Sick

"This comes at a time when Republicans are looking to gut the Clean Water Act and also the Safe Drinking Water Act. What are our options? Are we now forced to boil water because bottled water is not an economically feasible option for a lot of people?"
- Bryant Gumbel to Natural Resources Defense Council lawyer Erik Olson promoting a new NRDC study on the safety of drinking water, June 1 Today.

Nancy Kearney, Moderator: "David, what do you think the impact will be of the new Congress on existing environmental rules and regulations - as bad as environmentalists would have us believe?
David Seideman, Time reporter: "It may be that bad, if Clinton doesn't fulfill his promise to veto the GOP's most extreme measures. There may be some hope among moderate Republicans in the Senate, such as John Chafee of Rhode Island. But they're overshadowed by Bob Dole and a bunch of Western Senators who really hold the most power. A recent study by the Environmental Information Center shows that Americans are unaware of the GOP changes and react with revulsion when they discover them. So maybe the last best hope of saving these environmental laws is at the grass-roots level across the country."
- From Time Online on America Online, April 26.

 

Time's Film Critics, Time Warner Tools

"Has Bob Dole ever read his kids a fairy tale? Or sung a nursery rhyme? Or seen a classic Disney cartoon? In Hansel and Gretel, Jack and Jill, Bambi and Dumbo, the obsessive themes are death and dismemberment. These graphic horror stories tell toddlers that life is a dark forest where parents get killed and kids get eaten. As purveyors of `nightmares of depravity,' Warner Bros. ain't a patch on the Grimm Bros."
- Time film critic Richard Corliss reviewing Casper, June 12.

"What commends these movies to Dole is their marketplace success - he is a Republican, after all. If he had actually seen them (his staff admits he hadn't), he might be less pleased. For this is what they really say: that women need to be kept in their place, preferably by degrading them; that the powerless should gladly acquiesce in their exploitation by the powerful - incidentally, a basic definition of fascism; that privatizing emotions is, like privatizing social services, the way to build a happy, healthy society; that white males are truly boobs. We're past Republican now, heading for Neanderthal."
- Time film critic Richard Schickel on True Lies, The Lion King, Forrest Gump, The Santa Clause, and The Flintstones, same issue.

 

Socialist Reporters Turned Columnists

"Newtie has gone too far. When you take food out of the mouths of babes and claim it is in their best interests, as Gingrich did in defending his Draconian budget cuts, you cross the line from mere heartlessness to dangerous demagoguery. It is one thing to play the mean-spirited reactionary, gutting one social program after another while pandering to the greed of the more affluent voter. That is a morally wrong but logically consistent position. Taking $500 from a child on welfare and giving it to one whose parents earn more than $200,000 a year is a loathsome but defensible position to advocates of a social Darwinism that holds that only the strong deserve to live."
- Former L.A. Times reporter Robert Scheer, May 16 column.

"In an era of funhouse values, Americorps has been a magnet for young people who take their citizenship responsibilities seriously, and who express their patriotism quietly, through good works that foster a sense of community, and yes, even brotherhood. Naturally, the rabid leadership of the Republican Party feels Americorps must be destroyed."
- Former NBC News reporter Bob Herbert, May 24 New York Times column.

 

What Liberal Bias?

"The often-alleged liberal bias of the media was not borne out in self-descriptions obtained through the poll. Twenty-two percent of journalists described themselves as liberal, compared with 19 percent of the public surveyed. Only 5 percent of the journalists called themselves conservative, compared with 39 percent of the public."
- Associated Press reporter Rita Beamish, May 22 Boston Globe.

 

...Or You Become President of the United States

Announcer: "If Senator Bob Packwood really did what all those women say he did, it probably would have cost him his job long ago in corporate America. So why not in Washington?"
Clinton adviser Mandy Grunwald: "You not only keep your job, you become the most powerful chairman of the most powerful committee in the United States Senate."
Announcer: "Is Packwood too powerful to punish? A touchy subject on Eye on America, tomorrow on the CBS Evening News."
- CBS promo, June 5.

 

So Much for the Media Elite

"Linda Douglass has the story of sex, drugs, rock, and Dole."
- Dan Rather introducing story of Bob Dole's critique of Hollywood, June 1 CBS Evening News.

Dr. Goran Klintmalm: "A single donor donated seven organs to be transplanted, seven organs that are being transplanted here at Baylor today into six people, so that has much benefit, that single donor has done to his society and his fellow man."
Reporter: "Is the donor alive? Can you tell us that?"
- Exchange from press conference on Mickey Mantle's liver transplant, aired on Rush Limbaugh, the TV show, June 8.

 

- L. Brent Bozell III, Publisher;
-Brent H. Baker, Tim Graham; Editors
- James Forbes, Andrew Gabron, Mark Honig, Steve Kaminski, Gesele Rey, Clay Waters; Media Analysts
- Kathleen Ruff, Circulation Manager;
-Eugene Eliason, Melissa Gordon; Interns