Two Months Away....

Daffodils, April 8, 2010 in Hiram, Maine

Now.....

The View from my Study

A dwindling woodpile,
the half-buried pond garden,
with four feet of snow. 

“It's time for the human race to enter the solar system.”-Dan Quayle, the Sarah Palin of his time


MUNDUS VULT DECIPI, ERGO DECIPIATUR- PETRONIUS

Vice Presidents in my Lifetime and Some Things They Have Said

"The best audience is intelligent, well-educated and a little drunk." -Alben W. Barkley

"I leave you gentleman now and you will write it. You will interpret it. That's your right. But as I leave you I want you to know — just think how much you're going to be missing. You won't have Nixon to kick around any more, because, gentlemen, this is my last press conference and it will be one in which I have welcomed the opportunity to test wits with you."-Richard M. Nixon

"Jack was out kissing babies while I was out passing bills. Someone had to tend the store."-Lyndon Johnson

"Edgar, the law says that you must retire next January when you reach your seventieth birthday and I know you wouldn't want to break the law. But the nation cannot afford to lose you. Therefore, by virtue of an act pursuant to the authority vested in the President, I have today signed an Executive Order exempting you from compulsory retirement for an indefinite period of time."- Lyndon Johnson making J. Edgar Hoover FBI Director For Life

“I apologize for lying to you. I promise I won't deceive you except in matters of this sort.”-Spiro Agnew

"Write it when I'm dead." Gerald Ford to reporter Thomas M. DeFrank after Ford responded "You're right." when DeFrank commented that President Nixon was a "goner" during an interview four months before Nixon's resignation.

“My fellow Americans, our long national nightmare is over.”-Gerald Ford

"I looked upon him as my personal friend. And I always treasured our relationship. And I had no hesitancy about granting the pardon, because I felt that we had this relationship and that I didn't want to see my real friend have the stigma."-Gerald Ford on pardoning Richard Nixon

"No. 1, Lee Harvey Oswald was the assassin. And two, the commission found no evidence of a conspiracy, foreign or domestic. And in my judgment, there has been no new evidence that would undercut those two conclusions, Oliver Stone notwithstanding."-Gerald Ford

"The chief problem of low-income farmers is poverty"-Nelson Rockefeller

“You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure about you. We were born to manifest the glory of God that is within us.”-Nelson Rockefeller

“If you are sure you understand everything that is going on, you are hopelessly confused.”-Walter Mondale

"No, I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is one nation under God."-George H.W. Bush

“I have made good judgements in the past. I have made good judgements in the future.”-Dan Quayle

"A zebra does not change its spots."-Al Gore

"I had other priorities in the sixties than military service." -Dick Cheney

"My belief is we will, in fact, be greeted as liberators."- Dick Cheney

''If we do everything right, if we do it with absolute certainty, there's still a 30% chance we're going to get it wrong.''-Joe Biden

A motley crew to say the least. It must be stated for the record that not all of these quotes were made while these men were Vice Presidents (Nixon,Ford and Johnson). But all quotes are insights into their characters.

Musing of the Day:

Anyone who thinks an Islamic country can suddenly become a secular democracy is deluded. The United States was created to be a secular democracy and it must constantly struggle against the inertia of religion to continue to be one.

The Extra Credit Quote of the Day
"The pontifex maximus ''Scævola'' thought it expedient that the people should be deceived in religion; and the learned ''Varro'' said plainly, that there are many truths, which it is useless for the vulgar to know; and many falsities which it is fit the people should not suppose are falsities."-Augustine 

I muse.

Privacy? What privacy?

There is no privacy. There is nothing you can do. But there never was any privacy. You just needed the connections or the money to find things out. Now, anybody can find things out. It's much more democratic.

Chutney Ensnowed

My Jack Russell Terrier, Chutney, needs his anal glands expressed. I love dogs.

Michael Hudson

Michael Hudson says in this VIDEO that the average stock in America was held for 22 seconds last year. That tells me that big traders are manipulating the markets and that I don't have a chance when I buy a hundred shares on Ameritrade. There should be a huge tax on flipping stocks like that. It would put an end to shady programmed trading.

"A slave is one who waits for someone else to free him." - Rosellen Brown