Notable Quotables - 09/11/1995

 

Someday, Hawaii Might Become the 50th State

 

"President Clinton will be attending more ceremonies in Hawaii marking V-J Day, Victory over Japan. Saturday, Mr. Clinton went to a ceremony on a hill high above Honolulu. He praised those who served in the military 50 years ago, saying they saved the world. After today's ceremonies marking the end of World War II, President Clinton will head back to the United States."
- NBC anchor Giselle Fernandez, September 3 Today.

 

More Insight From Miss Hawaii

 

"Let's touch on your hard stands against affirmative action. You were Governor during the Los Angeles riots. Many of the people there believed those happen not just because of Rodney King, but because affirmative action didn't trickle down far enough. How do you propose to cure urban problems without bringing some kind of economic equality?"
- NBC anchor Giselle Fernandez to California Governor Pete Wilson, August 27 Today.

 

Meet Clinton's '96 Press Secretary

 

"So perhaps the weekend of World War II commemoration was somewhat of an epiphany for Clinton, and for the nation. Maybe the 50th anniversary of the end of World War II was a time when he came to the realization that his reluctance to answer his country's call was a mistake, and those who answered without a second thought forgave him. How else do we explain aging World War II veterans, as giddy as children, jockeying to get their pictures taken with the President, and camouflaged young soldiers with shaven heads shouting out `Four more years!'"
- USA Today reporter Richard Benedetto in Honolulu, September 5.

 

Senator Bill Bradley's A "Moderate"...

 

"Bradley is one of an endangered species in American politics, a true moderate."
- CNN political analyst William Schneider, August 19 Inside Politics, after the New Jersey Democrat said he wouldn't seek re-election.

"Bradley...he's got the right profile, he's sort of in the middle and he's got integrity."
- Time reporter Laurence Barrett on CNBC's Cal Thomas, August 23.

"Echoing growing disillusionment in Washington by moderates of both parties - including Bradley - [former New Jersey Gov. Thomas] Kean criticized a `lack of civility' and `meanness' in national politics..."
- Washington Post reporter Dale Russakoff, September 1. (Bradley's 1994 Americans for Democratic Action liberal rating: 85. His 1994 American Conservative Union rating: 4.)

 

...But More Moderate Senator Judd Gregg's A "Radical"?

 

"Gregg-ism (the supine adoption of Gingrich's far-out agenda and Bob Dole's kissin' cousin facsimile) would literally involve the transfer of income and wealth to the occupants of plush homes along the quiet streets of Amherst and Peterborough, straight from the pockets of working and retired families from Salem in the south all the way north to Berlin. From his perch on the budget and human resources committees, Gregg has been a down-the-line rubber stamp for radicalism; fortunately, serious Republican leaders to his north in Maine, west in Vermont and south in Rhode Island are picking up his slack. The good news is that Gingrich, Gregg, and the radicals are going to lose their fight to transfer income and wealth on this extreme scale."
- Boston Globe Washington columnist and former reporter Tom Oliphant on Gregg (R-NH), August 20. (Gregg's 1994 ADA liberal rating: 15. Gregg's 1994 ACU conservative score: 79.)

 

At Least His Victims Are Alive to Complain

 

"Good evening. Senator Bob Packwood has been one of the Senate's enduring embarrassments since it was disclosed that he had a long history of explicit sexual harassment and fondling, and now his career, his time as a U.S. Senator, apparently is very near an end."
- NBC's Tom Brokaw, September 6 Nightly News.

vs.

Anchor Mary Alice Williams: "It was 20 years ago tonight that a car swerved off a small bridge on Chappadquiddick Island off Massachusetts' coast...NBC's Andrea Mitchell tonight on how Ted Kennedy is winning respect 20 years later."
Mitchell: "In reforming the immigration law last week, Ted Kennedy was updating the rules he first legislated in 1965. It's that kind of nuts-and-bolts work that has earned the respect of colleagues - even conservatives."
- NBC Nightly News, July 18, 1989.

 

Harmless Communism and Its Harmful Overthrow

 

"But Vietnam's government is worried about the ugly side of the free market system: crime, unemployment, pollution, and most of all, political dissent."
- NBC reporter Andrea Mitchell, August 4 Nightly News.

"This is how Arbat Street looked then, 150 years ago. None of the buildings still stand - too much trauma. The end of the czars, a revolution, two World Wars, the fall of communism - it's all taken a heavy toll on this tired nation."
- NBC reporter Martin Fletcher in Russia, August 27 Today.

 

The "Nonpartisan" Group Seeking to Destroy the Religious Right

 

"Norman Lear, veteran TV and film producer and co-founder of the nonpartisan constitutional liberties organization People for the American Way, has doubts about the merger of Capital Cities/ABC with the Walt Disney Co."
- Unbylined item in Los Angeles Times, August 1.

 

Pat Makes Them Shiver

 

"Pat Buchanan is seen by many in the party as extreme. That's not my word. That's not the Democrats' words. That's the Republicans' words. I was on the floor of the convention in 1992 when Pat Buchanan delivered that speech in which he talked about taking back the country street by street. That sent shivers down the backs of many Republicans at that convention."
- CNN's Frank Sesno on C-SPAN's Sunday Journal, August 20.

 

Deficit of Consistency

 

"Apparently, the Republicans, who tend to govern by slogan, think the meaningless balanced budget and its accompanying tax cuts for the rich are more important than school lunches for the poor. That, of course, is absurd. The administration has proposed a humane bu dget that calls for no new debt by 2004, but the CBO, using less rosy projections, says the deficit would be about $200 billion then. So what? That would be just 1.7 percent of the projected gross domestic product."
- Former NBC News President Michael Gartner in his USA Today column, September 5.

vs.

"Before you listen to them trash Bill Clinton, before you put a new bumper sticker on your car, look at what happened between 1981 and 1992, the 12 years the White House was controlled by Ronald Reagan and George Bush. The budget deficit in 1980, the year before the Republicans took over, was about $73 billion. By 1992, their last year in office, it has soared to $340 billion (or, if you want to toss in the Social Security surplus, $290 billion). Responsible management? Hardly."
- Gartner in USA Today, April 18.

 

- L. Brent Bozell III; Publisher
- Brent H. Baker, Tim Graham; Editors
- Geoffrey Dickens, James Forbes, Steve Kaminski, Gesele Rey, Clay Waters; Media Analysts
- Kathleen Ruff, Circulation Manager; Gene Eliasen; Intern