I know... I know. Quite shocking. I was bored earlier so I went out to a local book store and perused the aisles until something caught my eye. That something was the hysterically brilliant "America (the book) - A Citizen's Guide to Democracy Inaction". I'm a huge "Daily Show" fan and I adore political satire, so I've been meaning to check this out for a while now but... I don't, shall we say, like to read books. That's not to say I don't enjoy reading... I do, just not from a book. But none the less, I picked it up and I'm enjoying it heartily. Very funny. I never thought I'd laugh out loud reading a book... I have at various articles and essays and what not, but not a book... which clearly shows how many books I've read.
I'd like to share some of this book's biting wit with you. And now, if I may, a few passages from "America (the Book)".
"Jefferson, you're on the two. Hamilton? You get the ten. I'm calling dibs on the one. That's all me, baby. What's that, Adams? You wanted the one? All right, that's it: You don't get to be on anything. That's right, I'm taking back the quarter. Anyone else want to complain? I didn't think so"
- George Washington, 1789
"Now, some have argued that Columbus actually discovered the West Indies, or that Norseman had discovered America centuries earlier, or that you really can't get credit for discovering a land already populated by indigenous people with a developed civilization. Those people are Communists. Columbus discovered America."
"The pen is mightier than the sword, if it has been dipped in deadly poison and is thrown from ten feet away. But really, you're better off with a sword."
- Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard's Almanac (first draft)
Very funny stuff. Anyone who watches the Daily Show would love this book... or anyone who sees today's government as the jumbled, bi-partisan, bitch fest that it more often than not tends to come off as. And now in closing... A presidential fun-fact!
Did you know that... "Millard Filmore, our 13th president, lived for eighteen years with a pair of magical talking cats, who for reasons known only to them insisted on calling their human master "Mr. Norris." Denise, the female of the pair, was also influential in the foreign policy of the Filmore Administration, a period later dubbed by historians as "The Era of the President Who Was Batshit Insane."
posted by Jerr @ 12:53 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home