Old Fogey's Quotes for Wednesday

Back from Seattle to the computer

"When it comes to poverty, the world has a short attention span."
LATimes editorial on the neglect of the poor ot this year's G-8 Summit
An Unsatisfying G-8 Summit

"I've had three or four calls asking if it's safe to come and wanting to know when we got the bomb threat."
Sherry Lewis, owner of the Old MacDonald's Petting Zoo in Woodville, AL, which has been named a terrorism target by the Department of Homeland Security
Joel Stein: The Terrorists Hate Our Baby Animals

"This is probably the best message we can give to the Middle East in regards to the trouble we are having over there right now."
Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-Ga.), regarding the House debate on an amendment to ban gay marriage
Man Upstairs Is in the House

"I'll never forget the night the president gave that speech from Jackson Square. He talked about stamping out poverty. He talked about things that showed the compassionate side of his compassionate conservative stance. Since then, what I've found is that he has been long on conservatism and short on compassion."
Rep. Elijah E. Cummings (D-Md.)
Bush's Poverty Talk Is Now All but Silent

"The Bush administration has had a consistent, forward-looking strategy on poverty. They have had a consistent effort to raise work levels, reduce out-of-wedlock childbearing and promote marriage."
Robert E. Rector, a senior research fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation
Bush's Poverty Talk Is Now All but Silent

"I wonder if this is how the summer of 1914 felt."
Harold Myerson, in WaPo editorial, comparing the escalation of hostilities prior to WWI and now
The Guns of July

"In general, lower income families tend to pay more for the exact same consumer product than families with higher incomes. For instance, 4.2 million lower income homeowners that earn less than $30,000 a year pay higher than average prices for their mortgages. About 4.5 million lower income households pay higher than average prices for auto loans. At least 1.6 million lower income adults pay excessive fees for furniture, appliances, and electronics. And, countless more pay high prices for other necessities, such as basic financial services, groceries, and insurance. Together, these extra costs add up to hundreds, sometimes thousands, of dollars unnecessarily spent by lower income families every year."
Matt Fellowes, in the introduction of a study by the Brookings Institute
Brookings Institution's Report

“The goal of this movement isn’t to help students. It’s to achieve vouchers at any cost.”
Ralph Neas, president of the liberal nonprofit group People for the American Way, regarding new Republican initiative on school vouchers, following a hushed-up study by the Department of Education that showed that public school students did as well or better than private school students of similar background
Republicans Propose National School Voucher Program

''The federal standards are not sufficient to prove that election systems are able to guarantee federally approved voting systems can adequately protect the integrity of our elections against unintentional failures or against tampering."
David Wagner, a specialist in computer science from Berkeley.
Lawmakers Warned About Voting Problems

"The problem is not his habit — savored by late-night comedians — of stumbling over multisyllabic words. It is his shocking lack of intellectual curiosity."
Jonathan Chait in LATimes editorial, regarding Bush's intelligence
Jonathan Chait: Is Bush Still Too Dumb to Be President?