“I wish I were as cocksure about anything as Tom Macaulay is about everything.”
“Melbourne’s celebrated comment on Macaulay” according to a letter from John O. Voll in National Review December 2, 1991
“Well, things are back to abnormal.”
Quoting myself from July 6, 2002 (and they still seem to be).
“Dear Mr. Dule: That would not be a ‘solution,’ it would be an approach. Let us know how it turns out. Cordially, WFB”
William F. Buckley Jr. in National Review June 26, 1995 (responding to a letter from a man claiming more conservatives than liberals were bald and asking if should become liberal to avoid hair loss)
Sir John A. “Macdonald slew [John Joseph Caldwell] Abbott with a single phrase: ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘a sweet smile. All from the teeth outward.’”
Pierre Berton The National Dream
“Homegoroshi: The Japanese technique of humiliating a person with exaggerated compliments.”
Globe & Mail September 25, 2000
“In 1913 a sign hung in the lobby of the Stag Hotel in Golden City, Ontario, stated succinctly, WE KNOW THIS HOTEL IS ON THE BUM. WHAT ABOUT YOURSELF?”
Peter Unwin in The Beaver October-November 2004
“It wasn’t clear whether this was obvious, false, or possibly both.”
Peter Foster in National Post November 19, 1999 [specifically regarding Peter Drucker and entering a “knowledge society” but it applies amazingly widely].
“You say I’m a bitch like it’s a bad thing.”
One of the “Expressions for women under stress” found on the Internet, in Globe & Mail March 16, 2001