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Random Acts of Free Speech


“The Republicans have had their chance at ruining the country, and now it’s the Democrat’s turn. I’m sure they’ll do a better job of it.”

“A better job of what?”

“Ruining the country.”

___________________

“Did you see the new Lincoln film ?” [“Lincoln,” directed by Steven Spielberg]

“I don’t go to the movies anymore.”

“Great flick. Some people have objected to Daniel Day-Lewis’ speaking voice; weak, they say.”

“Lincoln had a high pitched voice. [Steven] Douglas’s voice was deeper, more resonant.”

“How do you know that?”

“I read history books. It helps to pass the time when I’m not at the movies.

___________________

“Too bad about Lindsay Lohan. [The actress had just bopped someone in a bar]

“Some people never learn.”

“What do you think’s behind all that?”

“Maybe she’s roll-playing. Some of these Hollywood types have a real problem detaching themselves from their personas. Just look at Charley Sheen.”

 “A mess.”

“And Madonna, at the end of her career, showing her nipples on stage… Just sing…

“That’s what Elton John said.”

“Who?”

____________________
 

“There’s a woman in Florida -- a mail carrier no less – who slipped some poison into her husband’s tuna fish sandwich. Here’s the lede on the story, listen [reading from the paper]: ‘A Central Florida mail carrier was arrested on attempted murder charges after she tried to poison her husband's tuna fish sandwich, according to deputies.”

“That’s terrible.”

‘Yeah. I don’t think you can poison a sandwich. It won’t die, no matter how much poison you put in it. You can PUT POISON INTO A SANDWICH in an attempt to POISON YOUR HUSBAND. But you can’t poison the sandwich.”

“That’s terrible.”

“I know. Teaching grammar in fourth grade to prospective reporters is a lost art.”

“No, I mean it’s terrible she tried to poison her husband.”

“That too.”

___________________
 

After seeing an Oliver Stone film in which he bumps fists, supportively, with Venezuelan demagogue Hugo Chavez: “In Oliver Stone’s hands, a movie camera is a weapon of mass disinformation. He’s our Walter Duranty,” the ace New York Times reporter and Pulitzer Prize winner who thought Stalin’s man-made famine in Ukraine was neither man-made nor a famine].”

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