Notable Quotables - 11/02/1998

Tripp the Terrorist

"If there were an Ig-Nobel Peace Prize, who would win it?
o Slobodan Milosevic
o Osama bin Ladin
o Saddam Hussein
o Linda Tripp"
- "What do you think?" question of the day on the abcnews.com home page, October 15.

 

Wedgies for the Impeachers

"LARRY FLYNT: Wants to spend big money to publish pols' dirty secrets. Say, isn't that Ken Starr's job?
HOUSE REPUBLICANS: Constitutional scholars? More like a gang of vice principals hell-bent on holding detention."
- Losers in Time's "Winners and Losers" feature, October 19.

 

How About Generalissimo?

"Remember when the First Lady was here back in January and she talked about the vast right-wing conspiracy. You agree with a lot of what she had to say. If there is a hierarchy in that conspiracy, like a military hierarchy, where does Ken Starr fall? Is he a private, is he a general, what is he?"
- Today co-host Matt Lauer to James Carville in interview promoting his new screed, And the Horse He Rode In On: The People vs. Kenneth Starr, October 26.

 

Ken Starr is Jezebel?

"Newsweek magazine reporting this week, that despite their cozy immunity deal, Lewinsky and the Independent Counsel, Mr. Starr have never met face to face. The reason: a source telling Newsweek 'you don't want to schedule an appointment between Jezebel and the Pope.' Wait, I'm confused. In this reference, Jezebel is who?"
- Keith Olbermann on MSNBC's The Big Show, October 19.

 

Kneepad Nina Blows GOP Away

Chris Matthews: "Why do women give him a free ride? Women from the sort of left, the feminist sort of argument. Why do you give him a free ride? Say you don't care how he behaves as long as he defends your right to an abortion?"
Nina Burleigh, Time: "Well, because, look what's on the other side. I mean on the other side we've got 12 years of theocracy behind us."
- CNBC's Hardball, October 15. In July she told The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz: "I would be happy to give him [Clinton] a blowjob just to thank him for keeping abortion legal."

 

Conservatives Incite Murder

"How much of a threat do gays live under? Have anti-gay comments by the religious right contributed to attacks? And what can be done to stop the violence?"
- Chris Wallace opening ABC's Nightline, October 16.

"The Christian Right per se and some particular members on Capitol Hill have helped inflame the air so that the air that these bad people breathed that night was filled, filled with the idea that somehow gays are different, and not only are they different in that difference, they're bad and not only are they bad, they are evil and therefore evil can be destroyed. The next step to that to me, it's a three-step process, and that ends in destruction. I don't say that they were told to do that, they certainly weren't part of any plan to do that, but again, what air are they breathing now? It's the air filled with that hate....I mentioned Trent Lott, Jesse Helms and Dick Armey particularly. The Christian Coalition, the Family Research Council and the Concerned Women for America."
- Deborah Mathis of Gannett News Service on who inspired the murder of Matthew Shepard, Oct. 17 Inside Washington.

"You know, between Bill Clinton and their hatred of gays, you know, it's no wonder that things like this happen. When you create an atmosphere that is so anti-sexual in this country, you know, yes, the borderline personalities like these idiots are going to hear it and pick up on it and say, 'Oh, you know'.... When they hear Senators and Congressmen and people who they respect in an elevated position say that, you know, being gay is next to, you know, being the devil, of course, then they think, 'Well, you know, its okay. I'm sort of doing the work of the Congress.'"
- Bill Maher, host of ABC's Politically Incorrect, October 12.

 

Rivera & Dimond, Dynamite Duo

Geraldo Rivera: "Before there was Monica Lewinsky there was Whitewater, a potpourri of fraud allegations against the President and First Lady stemming from a 20-year-old failed real estate deal in Arkansas. Stripped to its bare essentials the case against the Clintons, as you're about to see, was shockingly flimsy."
Co-anchor Diane Dimond: "So why did it last for four years and cost $40 million? A look at the money and the men behind Ken Starr's Whitewater investigation indicates that Hillary Clinton may have been right when she said there was a right-wing conspiracy to bring down the President."
- CNBC's Upfront Tonight, October 23.

 

If Anyone Takes a Shot at Ken Starr, Arrest Geraldo Rivera

"When Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by an extremist who was opposed to the peace talks, many commentators at the time blamed Bibi Netanyahu who was Mr. Rabin's opponent at the time, for his political rhetoric, saying that by saying that people who were making peace with the Palestinians were in effect, countenancing terrorism, he in effect set up Rabin. Don't you feel some of that same heat? Doesn't anti-abortion rhetoric at some point verge on almost a back-handed pat on the back to those people?"
- Geraldo Rivera to Jerry Falwell, October 26 Upfront Tonight.

 

NBC Touts President Peacemaker

"The White House looks at this with such great irony. As the impeachment hearings grind on could you have a situation where next year the President cannot go to the Judiciary Committee on a particular day because he's receiving the Nobel Peace Prize? That's the kind of irony the White House looks at as they look at the success of President Clinton on this day."
- NBC News Washington Bureau Chief Tim Russert to Sara James, October 23 Today hours before the signing.

"You heard the King of Jordan, King Hussein, saying of President Clinton that he's known many Presidents, all of them dating back to Eisenhower, and saying that he's known none like President Clinton, saying that his dedication, his clearheadedness, his focus, his determination is unlike anything that he's seen from any American President dating back to Eisenhower. And if those words aren't so sweet to this White House, nothing else could be."
- Reporter David Bloom to MSNBC anchor Brian Williams at 5:53pm ET, minutes after the signing of the Israel/PLO deal.

"Now if this was a test of an embattled President's clout, aides here are ecstatic at its success and they say he took to these talks with an unusual intensity even for him they say, seeming to understand not only his role as peacemaker but as creator of his legacy."
- Claire Shipman concluding her NBC Nightly News story that night.

"As you know, President Clinton has had his difficulties back home here. Do you believe that his participation in this summit will portray him as a strong and effective leader?"

"But you prefer that President Clinton be around next year to help you continue this peace agreement?"
- Questions from Russert to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Meet the Press, October 25.

 

"Illusion" of a Fifth Column?

"Tune in Cold War, CNN's historic and prodigious 24-hour documentary series, whose sixth installment captures a bit of the anti-Red hysteria that gripped much of the nation in the 1950s....Scapegoats were needed to nourish the illusion of a vast Kremlin-directed fifth column conspiring against the United States from within....Today's sexual exposes notwithstanding, that was a witch hunt."
- Los Angeles Times TV critic Howard Rosenberg, September 25. (Episode airing on CNN November 1, 6, and 7.)

 

We're Not Gonna Take It Anymore

"ENOUGH ALREADY: In the real world, people want the Monica Madness to end. In Washington, the terrain is trickier. Democrats wish it would all go away; Republicans want to get Clinton but worry about coming off as sexual witch hunters. Is there any way out of this mess?"
- Newsweek headline, October 5.

 

Hey! Will I Have to Perform This Abortion Myself?

"Why can't the hospital approve an abortion?...

"Is the hospital willing to let her die? If she's caught in this Catch-22 in which she can't get an abortion by the hospital and she also can't get a transplant?...

"Maureen Britell [of the National Abortion Federation], why can't your organization get her an abortion elsewhere?...

"But if you're trying to help save her life and solve her problem, why can't you get her an abortion elsewhere?...

"Does she have to come in physically herself and ask for these records...Alright, can it be done today?...Can those records be done, transferred today?"
- Connie Chungs questions on the October 16 Good Morning America about a woman who wanted an abortion at Louisiana State University's medical center because she needs a heart transplant. The National Abortion Federation paid for her to get an abortion in Houston.

 

A Limbaugh Parody Far Beyond Larry King's Grasp

"Shouldn't someone tell President Clinton that one of his archenemies, Rush Limbaugh, actually said the following last week, speaking in defense of Bill Gates and Microsoft? 'It's OK to lie, everybody lies in business, especially in a civil case.' Apparently to Rush, lying is OK about business but not about sex."
- CNN's Larry King in his October 26 USA Today column, failing to recognize Limbaugh's parody of how liberals excuse Clinton's lies but want Gates pursued.

 

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