Thursday, December 31, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-31


"Americans are uneasy with their possessions, guilty about power, all of which is difficult for Europeans to perceive because they are themselves so truly materialistic, so versed in the uses of power."

Joan Didion (1934-     ) "7000 Romaine, Los Angeles 38," Slouching Towards Bethlehem, "The Howard Hughes Underground," The Saturday Evening Post, August 23, 1967

Howard Hughes, Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, and Grover Whalen in a ticker tape parade, celebrating Mr. Hughes' record-breaking flight around the world in 3 days, 19 hours, 14 minutes, and 10 seconds (July 15, 1938)

Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-30


"There is no finer investment for any community than putting milk into babies."

Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965) Radio broadcast (March 21, 1943)

Migrant Mother, Florence Owens Thompson, nursing her baby. Photograph by Dorothea Lange (Feb/Mar 1936)

Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Monday, December 28, 2015

Sunday, December 27, 2015

Quote of the day for 2015-12-27


"The full potentialities of human fury cannot be reached until a friend of both parties tactfully intervenes."

G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936) "The Skeptic as a Critic," The Forum, February 1929

Political cartoon by Henri Meyer, which depicts, among other things, the tensions between Great Britain and Germany while carving up China. Published in Le Petit Journal Sunday supplement (January 16, 1898)

Saturday, December 26, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-26


"Interest does not tie nations together; it sometimes separates them. But sympathy and understanding does unite them."

Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924) Speech at the Southern Commercial Congress in Mobile, Alabama, October 27, 1913

People on line around a spontaneous memorial of snow covered flowers and candles in front of the French embassy in Moscow, waiting to sign books of condolences to the French people (November 15, 2015 — Photograph by Stolbovsky)

Friday, December 25, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-25


"Who is the father of the Babe, fair maid? No, no, thou needst not answer, an Angel came to thee in a dream; it is enough, say no more. To thee and thy love child bring gifts of gold and frankincense and myrrh, to thee and thy Babe we bend the knee."

Elbert Hubbard (1856-1915) "A Word About Job," The Philistine, April 1897

William-Adolphe Bouguereau's Song of the Angels on the Subway by Alexey Kondakov (2015)

Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-23


"This intelligence-testing business reminds me of the way they used to weigh hogs in Texas. They would get a long plank, put it over a cross-bar, and somehow tie the hog on one end of the plank. They'd search all around till they found a stone that would balance the weight of the hog and they'd put that on the other end of the plank. Then they'd guess the weight of the stone."

John Dewey (1859-1952) Quoted by Dorothy Canfield Fisher in Vermont Tradition

Carrie Buck and her mother Emma at the Virginia Colony for Epileptics and Feebleminded. Photograph taken by A.H. Estabrook the day before the Buck v. Bell trial began in Virginia. (November 17, 1924)

Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-22


"She say, Celie, tell the truth, have you ever found God in church? I never did. I just found a bunch of folks hoping for him to show. Any God I ever felt in church I brought in with me. And I think all the other folks did too. They come to church to share God, not to find God."

Alice Walker (1944-    ) The Color Purple, "Dear Nettie," page 165

Joliet Jake (John Belushi) "sees the light" while Elwood (Dan Aykroyd) looks on, in The Blues Bothers (1980)

Monday, December 21, 2015

Sunday, December 20, 2015

Saturday, December 19, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-19


"No one can be as calculatedly rude as the British, which amazes Americans, who do not understand studied insult and can only offer abuse as a substitute."

Paul Gallico (1897-1976) Quoted in The New York Times, January 14, 1962

Portrait of Winston Churchill by Yousuf Karsh (December 30, 1941)

Friday, December 18, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-18


"Every institution not only carries within it the seeds of its own dissolution, but prepares the way for its most hated rival."

W.R. Inge (1860-1954) "Democracy and the Future," The Atlantic Monthly, March 1922

George W. Bush aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln during his infamous Mission Accomplished speech (May 1, 2003)

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-15


"New and stirring things are belittled, because if they are not belittled the humiliating question arises, 'Why then are you not taking part in them?'"

H.G. Wells (1866-1946) The World of William Clissold, volume 2

Front cover of Heather has Two Mommies (originally published in 1989—image source)

Monday, December 14, 2015

Saturday, December 12, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-12


"There is always inequality in life. Some men are killed in a war and some are wounded and some men never leave the country. … Life is unfair."

John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) Press Conference, March 21, 1962

Secretary of War Newton D. Baker (blindfolded) draws the first number in a nationwide lottery to determine the order of drafting men for the military. (June 27, 1918)

Friday, December 11, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-11


"I don't want to achieve immortality through my work…I want to achieve it through not dying."

Woody Allen (1935-    ) Quoted by Eric Lax in On Being Funny

Death and Boris Grushenko (Woody Allen) in Love and Death (1975)

Thursday, December 10, 2015

Wednesday, December 09, 2015

Tuesday, December 08, 2015

Monday, December 07, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-07


"An era can be said to end when its basic illusions are exhausted."

Arthur Miller (1915-2005) "The Year it Came Apart," New York magazine, Dec 30, 1974 / Jan 6, 1975

Flower Power, George Harris inserting flowers into the of rifles of National Guardsmen during the March on The Pentagon (October 21, 1967)

Friday, December 04, 2015

Wednesday, December 02, 2015

Quote of the Day for 2015-12-02


"Culture is an instrument wielded by professors to manufacture professors, who, when their turn comes, will manufacture professors."

Simone Weil (1909-1943) The Need for Roots, part 2, chapter 1

Lecture hall full of students and their MacBooks at the University of Missouri, School of Journalism (circa 2012)