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BETTER LEFT UNSAID
For all the “speechifying” they do, you’d think our politicians could avoid putting their feet where their mouths are. But not so, as David Olive scathingly demonstrates in Political Babble: The 1,000 Dumbest Things Said by Politicians published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (slightly adapted by editor). Here are some samplings: Vice President Dan Quayle referred to the slogan “A mind is a terrible thing to waste,” while addressing the United Negro College Fund: “What a waste it is to lose one’s mind… or to not have a mind.” Now, how can you argue with that? Newly inaugurated President Gerald Ford: “If Lincoln were alive today, he’d roll over in his grave.” President George Bush, after visiting Auschwitz: “Boy, they were big on crematoriums, weren’t they?” Marion Barry, mayor of Washington, D.C., in 1989: “Outside of the killings, we have one of the lowest crime rates in the country.”