by Ross Petras
Bernardo Zuleta, secretary general of the United Nations Law of the Sea Conference
On Directions, Giving Clear:
Yogi Berra (on the phone to a lost Joe Garagiola):
Where are you?
Joe Garagiola:
Some guy says to tell you I’m at the library.
Yogi Berra:
Oh, you ain’t too far, just a couple of blocks. Only don’t go that way, come this way.
On Directions, Giving Clear:
Separate together in a bunch. [And don’t] stand around so much in little bundles.
director Michael Curtiz to movie extras
On Directions, Giving Clear:
Everybody move helter … and skelter.
director Michael Curtiz to extras
On Directors:
They always bite the hand that lays the golden egg.
movie mogul Samuel Goldwyn
On Disasters, Natural and Political:
This is the worst disaster in California since I was elected.
California Governor Pat Brown, discussing a local flood
On Distinguishing Characteristics:
… the deceased had an impediment in his speech.
mayor in Estremadura province, Portugal, giving tips while announcing a search for a drowned man
On Diversity:
We have every mixture you can have. I have a black, I have a woman, two Jews and a cripple.
James Watt, Secretary of the Interior, referring to an advisory group in his agency
On Divine Callings, Modern:
It’s not listed in the Bible, but my spiritual gift, my specific calling from God, is to be a television talk-show host.
James Bakker, televangelist, PTL Network and Heritage USA founder. He said this before he was indicted.
On Dogs, Sparking:
Sir, it requires only a spark to let slip the dogs of war.
Lord Hartington, Duke of Devonshire, leader of the Liberal Unionists, during a debate on the critical state of relations between Russia and Turkey in 1877
On the Draft:
I did what any normal person would do at that age. You call home. You call home to mother and father and say, “I’d like to get into the National Guard.”
Dan Quayle, then Republican vice-presidential candidate, defending his National Guard service during the Vietnam War
On Dualism, Human:
None but himself can be his parallel.
Louis Theobald, eighteenth-century English critic, famous collator of Shakespeare, and author of The Double Falsehood
On Dublin, Ireland—The First Jewish Mayor of:
It could only happen in America.
Yogi Berra
On Drugs, How to Fight Abuse of:
Now, like, I’m President. It would be pretty hard for some drug guy to come into the White House and start offering it up, you know? … I bet if they did, I hope I would say, “Hey, get lost. We don’t want any of that.”
President George Bush talking about drug abuse to a group of students
On Drugs, How to Fight Abuse of:
… casual drug users ought to be taken out and shot.
Daryl Gates, Los Angeles police chief, telling the Senate Judiciary Committee what should be done with casual users of marijuana and cocaine
E
On Earth, Problems With:
The government is not doing enough about cleaning up the environment. This is a great planet.
contestant for Mr. New Jersey Male, when asked what he would do with a million dollars
On Economists, the Infallibility of:
In all likelihood, world inflation is over.
the managing director of the International Monetary Fund in 1959
On Economists, the Infallibility of:
There may be a recession in stock prices, but not anything in the nature of a crash.
Irving Fisher, economist, six weeks before the 1929 crash
On Economists, the Infallibility of:
Stock prices have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau.
Irving Fisher, economist, in a speech made nine days before the 1929 crash
On Economists, the Infallibility of:
The depression has ended…. In July, up we go.
Dr. Julius Klein, Assistant Secretary of Commerce, in a speech given on June 9, 1931. The following year, 1932, is generally considered the worst in the Depression.
On Education in New York:
There were allegations a number of students at schools in Brooklyn may have been involved in having some knowledge, particularly about social studies and possibly English.
Samuel Polatnick, executive director of the Board of Education’s Division of High Schools (1975)
On Elections, Necessity of Voters for:
Minnesota voters played a major role in the victory of that state’s gubernatorial primary elections yesterday.
National Rifle Association press release
On Electric Chairs, Traveling:
Folks read about the electric chair, they hear about it—but those folks with criminal minds don’t care about the law. But if they see that chair moving down the highway, it may save a life.
Georgia State Senator Ronnie Walker on the need for a traveling electric chair that would traverse the state for county executions
On Eloquence:
[President Carter] speaks loudly and carries a fly spotter, a fly swasher—it’s been a long day.
President Gerald Ford, in a speech during the 1976 presidential campaign
On Emphasis:
[I will] put down my foot with a strong hand.
overheard at a shareholders’ meeting
On Emptiness, the Fullness of:
In a few weeks it had been found out that this promise was full of emptiness.
W. Brodrick, Lord Midleton, British statesman who served in various posts including Secretary of State for War for India in the early 1890s
On English:
If English was good enough for Jesus Christ, it’s good enough for me.
a congressman to Dr. David Edwards, head of the Joint National Committee on Language, about the necessity for a commercial nation to be multilingual
On English:
Every nation must have its own traditional language as a primary language, which if it was not English is not likely to be.
George C. McGhee, “English–Best Hope for a World Language,” Saturday Review/World
On English Conversation for Japanese Police, Helpful Sample Dialogues of:
Policeman: What countryman are you?
Sailor: I am sailor belong to the Golden Eagle, the British ship.
Policeman: Why do you strike this jinriksha man?
Sailor: He told me impolitely.
Policeman: What does he told you impolitely?
Sailor: He insulted me, saying loudly “the Sailor, the sailor” when I am passing here.
Policeman: Do you striking this man for that?
Sailor: Yes.
Policeman: But do not strike him for it is forbidded.
Sailor: I strike him no more.
from The Practical Use of (English) Conversation for Police Authorities, quoted in Jack Seward, The Japanese, 1972
On Entertainment:
It’s dull from beginning to end. But it’s loaded with entertainment.
Michael Curtiz, Hollywood director, on a musical
On Enthusiasm:
To aid and guide you on your pathway to learning, the following assignments will help you to activate vehemently your newly acquired aim, “Enthusiasm.”
A vocabulary test will be given the day you return to school.
Oral book reports will be given the first week of school.
memo to 9th-grade students before Christmas vacation, quoted in Neil Postman, Crazy Talk, Stupid Talk, 1976
On the Environment:
It’s time to stand the history of wetlands destruction on its head.
Geor
ge Bush, discussing wetlands protection with the group Ducks Unlimited
On Epitaphs, Great:
Here lies Captain Ernest Bloomfield. Accidentally shot by his orderly, March 2nd 1879. Well done, good and faithful servant.
grave inscription of British soldier, in Northwest Frontier of modern-day Pakistan
On Equal Pay Act of 1963, Unusual Provisions of:
The College’s Affirmative Action Policy and the policy of non-discrimination which assure equal employment opportunity and access to programs are based on the following state and federal laws, and executive orders:
… 14) Equal Pay Act of 1963 (requires equal sex for equal work)
Evergreen State College handbook, reported in The Chronicle of Higher Education
On Equal Rights:
Equal rights were created for everyone.
contestant in the 1990 Mr. New Jersey Male pageant
On Equal Rights:
Human beings are not animals, and I do not want to see sex and sexual differences treated as casually and amorally as dogs and other beasts treat them. I believe this could happen under the ERA.
Ronald Reagan, speaking against the Equal Rights Amendment
On Errors, Typographical:
The hell it was. It was a clean base hit.
Johnny Logan, ex-Milwaukee Braves shortstop, after someone said that the newspaper’s reporting of O hits for the game was a typographical error
On Ethics, Congressional:
I’ve got 423 dairy farmers in my district, and I’ve got to rise above principle.
Tennessee State Representative John Bragg, on why he was for [fair trade pricing] price controls on milk but against it for liquors
On Etiquette, Military Juntas and:
It was a mistake. It shows a lack of politeness to kill people when the Pope asks us not to do it.
Guatemalan government official on the execution of political prisoners just before the Pope’s visit
On Etiquette, Pressing Moments in:
The chairs in the cabin are for the ladies. Gentlemen are not to make use of them till the ladies are seated.
instructions posted in a river cruise ship, Suir River, Ireland
On Eulogies, Bad:
A great Irishman has passed away. God grant that as many great, and who wisely love their country, may follow him.
Times of London, as reported in Handybook of Literary Curiosities, 1925
On Exaggerations:
All I said was that the trades were stupid and dumb, and they took that and blew it all out of proportion.
Ron Davis, Minnesota Twins pitcher, commenting on press reports quoting him as criticizing team managers for trading top players
Excess Verbiage, Necessity to Eliminate:
I savagely correct reports and drafts with a blue pencil. I cut them to ribbons, blot out the repetitions, mixed metaphors, circumlocutions, misspelled words, and dreary Madison Avenue or technical clichés, and the same writers, perhaps a bit angry or chagrined, triumphantly send back the same tripe the next day. Either they are figuratively thumbing their noses at an idiosyncrasy of the boss, or they are unteachable.
Robert Moses, former New York Secretary of State, New York City parks commissioner, CEO, New York City Tunnel Authority, and other municipal offices, on the need for clear and concise memos from his staff
On Exclusivity:
Members and Non-Members Only.
sign outside Mexico’s Mandinga Disco in the Hotel Emporio, as reported in Far Eastern Economic Review
On Existentialism:
I can’t think of any new existing law that’s in force that wasn’t before.
President George Bush, discussing import laws
On Explanations:
… the story is the unveiling of the possibility of the impossibility of the unveiling.
Professor H. Hillis Miller, of the University of California at Irvine, about Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story “The Minister’s Black Veil,” in his presentation, “From the Theory of Reading to the Example Read”
On Explorers, Remarkable Feats by:
Questioner:
Was Captain Cook killed on his first voyage?
Richard Porson:
I believe he was, but he did not mind it much, but immediately entered on a second.
Richard Porson, Cambridge professor and English classical scholar in the late eighteenth century
On Exports, Routine:
[The exports include] thumbscrews and cattle prods, just routine items for the police.
Commerce Department spokesman on a regulation allowing the export of various products abroad
On Exposing Oneself While Campaigning:
Nixon has been sitting in the White House while George McGovern has been exposing himself to the people of the United States.
Frank Licht, then governor of Rhode Island, overvigorously campaigning for McGovern in the 1972 election
On Exposing Oneself While Off Duty:
What he does on his own time is up to him.
Harlon Copeland, sheriff of Bexar County, Texas, when one of his deputies was caught exposing himself to a child
F
On Facts:
Facts are stupid things.
Ronald Reagan, misquoting John Adams in a speech to the Republican convention
On Facts:
Some of the facts are true, some are distorted, and some are untrue.
a State Department spokesman, commenting on an article in Foreign Policy
On Facts:
Don’t confuse me with the facts. I’ve got a closed mind.
Earl Landgrebe, Republican Congressman from Indiana and Nixon supporter, when told about incriminating conversations on the Watergate tapes
On Facts, Indisputable:
The power of the head of state is not unlimited. Why is it said the power of the President is not unlimited? Probably the idea comes from the English translation: “Is not unlimited.”
Speaker of the Indonesian Parliament Kharis Suhud, in a 1988 TV interview, quoted in the Far Eastern Economic Review
On the Facts of Life, Some Misconceptions About:
Everyone who is for abortion was at one time a feces.
Peter Grace in an introduction to a Ronald Reagan speech; quoted on National Public Radio by Jim Angle
On Failure:
Even Napoleon had his Watergate.
Danny Ozark, Philadelphia Phillies manager, commenting about a Phillies’ ten-game losing streak
On Failure, Reasons for:
We made too many wrong mistakes.
Yogi Berra, explaining why the Yankees lost the 1960 World Series
On Fame:
When I write about anything the public makes a point to know nothing about it.
Oliver Goldsmith, eighteenth-century Anglo-Irish poet, novelist, and dramatist
On Families, Importance of Large:
What really causes marital abuse is small families. If all women had a lot of brothers, this would never take place.
Charles Poncy, Iowa State Representative (D-Ottumwa)
On Families, What Are:
The first would be our family. Your family, my family—which is composed of an immediate family of a wife and three children, a larger family with grandparents and aunts and uncles. We all have our family, whichever that may be.
Dan Quayle, then vice-presidential candidate, during the 1988 campaign in a speech to Virginia schoolchildren
On Famous Addresses:
I’ve just returned from 10 Drowning Street, so I know what I’m talking about.
movie mogul Sam Goldwyn in a political argument—he meant the Prime Minister’s residence, number 10 Downing Street
On Fascism, Baseball Definition of:
Don’t you know I’m a fascist? You know, a guy who says one thing and means another?
Danny Ozark, Phillies manager, quoted in Jay Johnstone, Temporary Insanity
On Fashion:
The cows started
to look tired, something from last season. Buffalo are much more sympathique.
fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent, on why he bought a herd of buffalo for his estate in Normandy
On Father/Son similarities:
The similarities between me and my father are different.
Dale Berra, Yogi Berra’s son
On Feet, Location of:
The clay feet of Germany will be revealed when we take off the gloves.
letter in the Sunday Chronicle, just before World War I
On Filling in the Boxes, Why You Shouldn’t Worry if You Don’t:
Information is voluntary. Failure to provide information could subject individual to be called on extended active duty when member might be eligible for assignment to Standby Reserve….
Privacy Act Statement, U. S. Air Force Reserve, mid-1970s
On Film Dialogue, Great Moments In:
Once they were men. Now they are land crabs.
