Thursday, Sep. 18, 2008
Verbatim
'Sex, drugs and the Bush Administration officials once again in cahoots with Big Oil.' CHUCK SCHUMER, New York Senator, on a report charging that federal employees used drugs, had sex and exchanged improper gifts with energy-industry representatives
'We are not a flock of sheep who jump into the abyss just because one sheep has done so.' YULIA TYMOSHENKO, Ukrainian Prime Minister, refusing to resign after President Viktor Yushchenko's party left the ruling coalition, causing the government to collapse
'It's undeniable who my relatives are, but I will do things the right way.' SOMCHAI WONGSAWAT, Thailand's newly elected Prime Minister, on his brother-in-law, exiled former PM Thaksin Shinawatra
'You have been sworn to ignore it.' YALE GALANTER, defense attorney, telling jurors at O.J. Simpson's robbery-kidnapping trial to forget about his 1995 murder trial
'I find this both interesting and disturbing.' HENRY T. GREELY, Stanford Law bioethicist, after an Indian court convicted a suspect on the basis of evidence from a brain scan--a first
'Every time I thought I was getting somewhere, they'd start speaking Spanish.' CHARLIE RANGEL, New York Representative, on his failure to pay taxes on a villa he owns in the Dominican Republic
'Maybe he thought he was going to have a more folksy ride.' BARBARA WALTERS, cohost of The View, after Cindy McCain accused the show of attacking her husband during an appearance
Back & Forth:
The Great Outdoors
'This ruling will restore the quiet and the clean air in Yellowstone for everyone to enjoy.' AMY MCNAMARA, director of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition, after a federal judge rejected a plan to allow more than 500 snowmobiles a day into the national park
'Wyoming experts are the best stewards of our land, not radical federal Washington judges.' Wyoming Senator JOHN BARRASSO, denouncing the ruling
Plastics
'The FDA is ignoring all of this research.' FREDERICK VOM SAAL, a University of Missouri professor, on a report that links high levels of bisphenol A (BPA), a compound used in plastics, with diabetes and heart disease
'Right now, our tentative conclusion is that it's safe.' LAURA TARANTINO, head of the FDA's office of food-additive safety, defending the agency's earlier assessment that the chemical posed no threat. Bottlemaker Nalgene announced plans to stop using BPA
LEXICON
fruit philanthropist n.--Someone who voluntarily harvests surplus fruit and then donates it to food banks and centers for the elderly USAGE: "Thus was born North Berkeley Harvest, part of a small but expanding movement of backyard urban gleaners--they might be called fruit philanthropists." --New York Times, Sept. 14, 2008
Sources: AP; AFP (2); Los Angeles Times; International Herald Tribune; New York Times; ABC
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