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
In my latest Loonie Politics column I say all the people suddenly demanding that noisy protests with an ugly fringe be denounced and driven from the public square, to say nothing of blockades and actual vandalism, will be asked to take a similar approach to the next one even if they sympathize with its cause.
In my latest NP Platformed newsletter I say Whoopi Goldberg’s racially insensitive and obtuse comments on the Holocaust might actually help us move back toward sanity on race, and on cancel culture as well.
“‘A thing may be too sad to be believed or too wicked to be believed or too good to be believed; but it cannot be too absurd to be believed in this planet of frogs and elephants, of crocodiles and cuttle-fish.’”
G.K. Chesterton quoted in A.L. Maycock, The Man Who Was Orthodox
“Or perhaps not only the seasons but everything else, social history included, moves in cycles. Not, however, that earlier times were better than ours in every way – our own epoch too has produced moral and intellectual achievements for our descendants to copy. And such honourable rivalry with the past is a fine thing.”
Tacitus The Annals of Imperial Rome
“I am constantly asked what we are going to do with the [Nobel economics] prize money – $1.2 million before Uncle Sam takes his very large bite. The answer to that is a simple lesson in economics. Wants always expand to take advantage of new opportunities, which explains why consumers in rich countries feel no more satiated than do those in poor countries. My wife and I won’t have the slightest difficulty spending the prize money.”
Gary Becker in Business Week November 2 1992 [but if so then the marginal utility of new income is zero which surely is not true]
“Feeling badly done to is not a saleable commodity.”
Another of mine, from September 16, 2005 (these days I’m not so sure, but it still shouldn’t be)
“You can pray all you want but eventually David had to pick up a stone and act against Goliath”
A sign a woman was holding at an unidentified protest in an image emailed by a friend without source.