Beyond Pathetic
"Monuments and national
parks are shut. So are museums. A long-awaited rare exhibit of
the Dutch painter Vermeer at the National Gallery, eight years
in the making, is closed. And the shutdown now has a human face.
Joe Skattleberry and his wife Lisa both work for the government.
Both have been furloughed. They can't afford a Christmas
tree."
- ABC reporter Jack Smith, December 22 World News
Tonight, the fifth day of the shutdown.
Dan Rather: All Dork, All the Time
"I'm all news, all the
time. Full power, tall tower. I want to break in when news
breaks out. That's my agenda. Now respectfully, when you start
talking about a liberal agenda and all the, quote, liberal bias
in the media, I quite frankly, and I say this respectfully but
candidly to you, I don't know what you're talking about. Now if
you want to talk about an issue, what do I believe as a citizen
of the United States of America, I can tell you what I believe
in. I believe in a strong defense, clean water, and tight money.
Now whatever that makes me politically, that's what I am. What I
don't like, and if you want to see my neck swell or the hair
begin to rise on the back of my neck, is to be tagged by someone
else's label. I try really hard not to do that with other
people, particularly people who are in public service and
politics."
- Dan Rather to talk radio host Mike Rosen of
KOA in Denver, November 28.
Reality Check:
"It is not just Congress that is taking a sharp turn to the
right. The surge to the right on Capitol Hill is making waves
all over the country on openly politically partisan and
sometimes racist radio."
- Rather, January 4, 1995 CBS
Evening News.
"While others in the GOP
pack are running as Mr. Right or Mr. Far Right, Senator Lugar is
stressing his foreign policy expertise."
- Rather on the
March 3, 1995 CBS Evening News.
"Even after Oklahoma City,
you can turn on your radio in any city and still dial up hate
talk: extremist, racist, and violent rhetoric from the host and
those who call in."
- Rather, April 27, 1995 CBS Evening News.
"Powell did say he is
planning to be active in Republican politics, a shot at the
party's hard right."
- Rather, November 8, 1995 CBS
Evening News.
Seething Hatred for Tax Cuts
"We're all deficit hawks
here. Let's scrap the tax cut. Let us not have ice cream before
the spinach because we have to take so much more spinach in as a
result of these tax cuts. I thought one of Clinton's worst
moments was proposing his tax cut back in December. It was a
weak one, and it didn't really get him anything and it looked
like a copycat crime more or less."
- Time columnist
Margaret Carlson on CNBC's Tim Russert, December 5.
"If there is going to be a
deal since both sides have tax cuts on the table, I'm afraid
we'll end up with some tax cut, even though that's the last
thing we need when we're trying to fix the deficit."
-
Time contributing writer Matt Miller on C-SPAN's Sunday Journal,
December 10.
"Is it too much to ask
this: That both sides spare us those declarations about how the
government must start operating like a family with a financial
problem. Because what family, with more bills to pay than money
to pay them...would say, `Even though we have to cut back, let's
take what money we can scrape together now and give ourselves a
big gift.' But that's exactly what both sides are saying when
they propose a major tax cut."
- CBS Face the Nation host
Bob Schieffer in an end-of-show commentary, December 17.
Enid vs. Hillary
"If you look at what was
written about her when she was campaigning, it talks about how
detail-oriented and meticulous and forceful she was, and how she
campaigned on an issue of personal responsibility, as well as
family values, and attacked her opponent - a very vicious
campaign. All of those chickens are coming home to roost, and I
don't know whether she was blinded by love or by ambition, she
saw that money coming and she said `Come right in here'....She's
either a greedy fool or a stupid fool, but people don't want
their Congressperson to be either one."
- Time Washington
reporter Elaine Shannon on Rep. Enid Waldholtz's financial and
legal troubles over husband Joe on PBS's To The Contrary,
December 16.
vs.
"I believe her story that
it was smarts and luck and some good advice. Who of us at the
age of 30 hasn't taken a few risks, and I wish my risks had been
that successful...Of course, maybe she took some advice of some
people who later ran into legal problems in terms of lawsuits,
but I think all of us may have done that at one time or another.
You can't be responsible for the lives of every broker and
banker you ever run across."
- Shannon on Hillary
Clinton's $100,000 cattle futures profit, Fox Morning News on
March 31, 1994.
Vietnam Doves Turn Bosnia Hawks
"I think Vietnam was a
paper tiger that we were fighting over there. I think this is
more justified."
- Newsweek contributor Eleanor Clift,
December 2 McLaughlin Group.
Too Many Conservatives
"Senator Mark Hatfield,
Representative Pat Schroeder, leaving the Congress, joining
others like Bill Bradley and Sam Nunn. Drowned out by the sound
of one hand clapping, and they are all right hands. On the other
hand, there's Democratic Senator Paul Wellstone from Minnesota.
He calls himself a liberal progressive, and he's a lonely voice
in the Senate of Bob Dole and Phil Gramm. What happened to the
opposition? To the whole idea of opposition in America?"
-
ABC reporter John Hockenberry's essay, December 3 Good Morning
America.
NPR's Christmas Wish
"The Rapture, and I quote,
`is the immediate departure from this Earth of over four million
people in less than a fifth of a second,' unquote. This
happily-volatilized mass of the saved were born again in Jesus
Christ. Everybody left behind will basically go to Hell, but not
before experiencing Armageddon, which is a really bad end of the
world. If you find yourself in this situation, there isn't much
you can do except one, starve yourself, and two, get your head
cut off. This loving Christmas message coming as it did amid the
jingle of the mall Santa and the twinkling manger at the corner
of Canal and the Ramparts made it clear that the Rapture is
indeed necessary. The evaporation of four million people who
believe this crap would leave the world an instantly better
place."
- New Orleans-based National Public Radio
commentator Andrei Codrescu, December 19 All Things
Considered.
David Brinkley Scolds Paula Zahn
Cal Thomas: "Could you get
away, for example, with asking a question like this, that was
recently asked by a major network anchor of Pat Buchanan, who
happened to be the guest on the program: `You've got political
enemies calling you an isolationist, a bigot, you're anti-gay,
and some even go so far as saying your social stands are
reminiscent of Nazi Germany.' Now that's the kind of
ideologically loaded stuff that turns a lot of people off, isn't
it?
David Brinkley: "That is so loaded, it's overloaded,
and it destroys itself in its own excess. Nobody would ever take
that question seriously. I wouldn't even bother to answer
it."
- December 7 exchange on CNBC's Cal Thomas about CBS
This Morning co-host Paula Zahn's July 5 question to Buchanan, a
quote which appeared in the Best Notable Quotables of 1995.
- 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