#w

Stop worrying about the 'dumbing down' of our language by bloggers, tweeters, cableheads and MSM thumbsuckers engaged in a 'race to the bottom' of the page by little minds confined to little words. ↗

— William Safire

#bloggers #bottom #confined #down #engaged

The noun phrase straw man, now used as a compound adjective as in 'straw-man device, technique or issue,' was popularized in American culture by 'The Wizard of Oz.' ↗

— William Safire

#american #american culture #compound #culture #device

The wonderful thing about being a New York Times columnist is that it's like a Supreme Court appointment - they're stuck with you for a long time. ↗

— William Safire

#appointment #being #columnist #court #like

Today, war of necessity is used by critics of military action to describe unavoidable response to an attack like that on Pearl Harbor that led to our prompt, official declaration of war, while they characterize as unwise wars of choice the wars in Korea, Vietnam and the current war in Iraq. ↗

— William Safire

#attack #characterize #choice #critics #current

I think the biggest change has been realizing I now have three children. ↗

— Katey Sagal

#biggest #biggest change #change #children #i

When you tour with a band, you're just out there, and it's just you guys. That's your little universe. If you do a play, it's the same deal. That becomes your world, for the cast and crew. ↗

— Katey Sagal

#becomes #cast #crew #deal #guys

What do you call a co-worker these days? Neither teammate nor confederate will do, and partner is too legalistic. The answer brought from academia to the political world by Henry Kissinger and now bandied in the boardroom is colleague. It has a nice upper-egalitarian feel, related to the good fellowship of collegial. ↗

— William Safire

#answer #bandied #brought #call #colleague

When I need to know the meaning of a word, I look it up in a dictionary. ↗

— William Safire

#i #know #look #meaning #meaning of

Writers who used to show off their erudition no longer sing in the bare ruined choir of the media. ↗

— William Safire

#choir #erudition #longer #media #off

I don't know, Y'know, I always wanted to be one of those cheerleader girls and I never was that, and I was never sort of cute and perky, and I always thought it was fun to be cute and perky, and those, I don't know what those girls are doing now. ↗

— Katey Sagal

#cheerleader #cute #doing #fun #i