David Sedaris on Presidential Elections

David Sedaris offers this analogy to help us understand undecided voters:

I think of being on an airplane. The flight attendant comes down the aisle with her food cart and, eventually, parks it beside my seat. “Can I interest you in the chicken?” she asks. “Or would you prefer the platter of shit with bits of broken glass in it?” To be undecided in this election is to pause for a moment and then ask how the chicken is cooked.

Dear Wall St., do us all a huge favor: Jump!

Yeah, this seems about right:

Smarter than You

New Rule: Republicans need to stop saying Barack Obama is an elitist, or looks down on rural people, and just admit you don’t like him because of something he can’t help, something that’s a result of the way he was born. Admit it, you’re not voting for him because he’s smarter than you.
--Bill Maher

Fascism in the U.S.

Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear.

—Harry S. Truman, 33rd US President

We are none of us alone

From the TV show ”Life”.

We are none of us alone
Even as we exhale it is inhaled by others
The light that shines upon me shines upon my neighbor as well
In this way everything is connected to everything else
In this way I am connected to my friend even as I am connected to my enemy
In this way there is no difference between me and my friend
In this way there is no difference between me and my enemy
We are none of us alone

Devoid of Reason also wrote it down, as did Empty Notebook.

Science and Religion

from What’s New:

Science owes its success to a culture of openness in which Nature is “The Decider.” Anything else is just religion.

—Bob Park

On Reality and Delusion

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
—Carl Sagan

The Sight of Stars

"For my part, I know nothing with any certainty, but the sight of stars makes me dream.”—Vincent van Gogh

The Most Valuable Statement in Science

"Captain, the most elementary and valuable statement in science, the beginning of wisdom, is ‘I do not know.’”—Lt. Commander Data

On Reality

"Reality is that which, when you don’t believe in it, doesn’t go away.”—Peter Viereck

Lyfe So Short

"The lyfe so short; the craft so long to lerne.”
—Chaucer, Assembly of Fowles, 1386

As It Is

The first few paragraphs of a Heather Havrilesky article in Salon about something completely irrelevant:

Sometimes it’s important to stop and smell the roses. Similarly, sometimes it’s important to stop and consider the fact that the world is filled with total idiots who only care about the bottom line.

Or, should I say, most people on this planet are disappointingly stupid, and most people on this planet are disturbingly focused on making a profit at the expense of creating things that are genuine, heartfelt, clever, moving or even mildly redeeming. Some people are smart, sure, and some people are willing to set wealth aside for the sake of quality, but smart people who care about quality are rare. You know a few of them, I’m sure—there are billions of us here, after all. But the vast majority of us are money-grubbing, soul-sucking, pandering whore-dogs with no more dignity or soul than a particularly virulent strain of foot fungus.

And just as a fungus needs warmth, moisture and a shady place to grow, the profit-minded halfwits grow in the shady stank of American culture, a dank and fetid place where empty-headed sea donkeys and white-toothed, grinning yes men thrive and are paraded through town, while thoughtful artists and pensive smarties are left to sulk on the sidelines.

Belief in Miracles

"[T]he ability to believe in miracles means the inability to recognize reality and react to facts.”—Chuck Dupree, November 14, 2005

On Journalistic Balance

Journalistic balance comes into play when a story involves opinion: Should gay marriage be legal? Should we invade Iraq? Should we promote bilingual education or English immersion? For such stories an ethical journalist is obligated to give each competing view its most articulate presentation and roughly equivalent space.

But when the subject is a matter of fact, the concept of balance is irrelevant.

—Ross Gelbspan, Mother Jones

Leave, O leave me to my sorrows

Leave, O leave me to my sorrows;
Here I’ll sit and fade away,
Till I’m nothing but a spirit,
And I lose this form of clay.

Then if chance along this forest
Any walk in pathless ways,
Thro’ the gloom he’ll see my shadow
Hear my voice upon the breeze.

William Blake, from Songs from an Island in the Moon, XIII