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By Syed M.Aslam
May 14 - 20, 2001
*** " WELL, IT IS the flip side that
interests me: success is homogeneous, failure is rich . . . You can
become rich without having any talent (via the scratchcard and the
rollover lottery). You can become famous without having any talent,
((by abasing yourself on some television nerdathon). But you can't
become talented without having any talent."
(Novelist Martin Amis, the 'bad boy of English
letters', critici sing Britons' obsession for successs and game show
culture)
*** "TEXT-MESSAGING generation against
the vacationless class."
(Jailed former Philippine President Joseph Estrada
blaming his overthrow in January on the country's 'elite class' as a
conspiracy against the working class)
*** "THEY COME here and they kill
unarmed women and children and he got a medal? . . . If I met him, I
don't know if I would kill him or curse him. I don't think I'd want to
say anything to him at all."
(Witness recalling the carnage by US Navy Seal
squad lead by Lieutenant Bob Kerry, a decorated soldier turned
politician, which killed some three dozen civilians in 1969 in Thanh Phong, Vietnam)
*** "... HE HOPES he doesn't butcher the
Spanish as badly as he has the English."
(White House spokesman Ari Fleischer quoting
President George W. Bush, known for his mangling of the English
Language, on taping his weekly radio address in Spanish)
*** "IT WORKS, torture. Most people
crack and talk. Afterwards, mostly, we finished them off. Did this
trouble my conscience? I have to say no. I got used to all that."
(Former French generel Paul Aussaresses saying that
he tortured and killed 24 captives during the freedom movement of
Algiers in 1957)
*** "YOU OVERTHREW the shah 22 years
ago, but there is another shah one thousand times stronger and better
armed. This (new) shah is imperialism, and it's main stronghold is
only miles away from our border."
(Firebrand Cuban President Fidel Castro urging Iran
to help defeat US imperialism on the last day of his first-ever visit
to the Islamic republic which accorded him a red-carpet welcome)
*** "THERE ARE always those who seek to
re-create the journey of suffering and pain among people. They try to
kill the principle of religions in the same mentality in which they
betrayed Jesus Christ."
(Syrian President Bashar al-Assad saying that the
suffering of Arabs under Israeli occupation was similar to that of
Jesus Christ at the hands of the Jews at a farewell ceremony at the
end of Pope John Paul's landmark visit to his country)
*** "POLITICIANS WHO have played their
innings and have been bowled out on zero have no place in Pakistani
politics."
(Administrative head, Chief Executive General
Pervez Musharraf, asking 'those politicians who have rendered
themselves useless' to stay home instead of misusing May Day for
holding rallies)
*** "AT THE END of the day, what America
is to the world is not only what we say or do, it is who we are. And
we are not hemleted giants hiding in our bunkers awaiting the
enemy."
(US Secretary of State Colin Powell defending
changing the emphasis of current US anti-terrorism policy from
'nation-specific' to 'group-specific')
*** "IF THE INSTIGATORS had appealed to
the mid-ranking officers, the idealists who are angry at how the rich
control everything in the Philippines, the coup might've worked."
(Unnamed Western diplomat explaining why the failed
coup attempt by the supporters of deposed and jailed President Estrada
did not succeed)
*** "WE NO LONGER LIVE in an era, or a
world, in which rivers can be endlessly dammed, aquifers relentlessly
pumped, ecosystems degraded and impoverished ... We have to focus on
how we use water. That's where new water will be 'found."
(Chairman of World Commission on Dams, Kader Asmal,
whose final report concludes that despite significant benefits dams
remain an unacceptable choice as they extract a heavy price in terms
of cost, environmental impact and displacement of people)
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