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I think the Bushes would have liked President Coolidge, though I often wonder what nickname 43 would pick for 30. President Bush has great respect for his father, and so did President Coolidge, whose father was also in government, albeit in a smaller way.

Amity Shlaes

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Amity Shlaes
Age: 64
Born: 1960
Born: September 10
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More quotes by Amity Shlaes

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There's something unsettling about the education of a child who comfortably enumerates the rules for surviving zombie apocalypse but finds it uncomfortable to enumerate the rules of his grandparents' faith, if he knows them.
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Anything can be done if you find friends to do it with.
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The difference between recession and depression is simple. Recession, goes the saying, is when you lose your job depression is when I lose mine.
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Fame is worth less than service.
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Coolidge's stat was so low he's ranked in the bottom half of presidents. What I found when I encountered this man was the leader I might like to see today.
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Although unions may be good for a worker, singular, they are not always good for workers, plural. Especially when it comes to finding a job.
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With demands for special education or standardized test prep being shouted in their ears, public schools can't always hear a parent when he says: 'I want my child to be able to write contracts in Spanish,' or, 'I want my child to shake hands firmly,' or, 'I want my child to study statistics and accounting, not calculus.
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Today we care about budgets more than anything. Our American future hangs on the ability of government to cut budget.
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If Coolidge were a stock, he'd be a buy. The experts have historically ranked Coolidge in the bottom quartile or bottom half of all presidents. But his economic performance and his statesmanship suggest Coolidge belongs in the top quarter of presidents. The disparity between the Coolidge price and Coolidge value is huge. So revision is warranted.
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The donning of the ear buds marks the beginning of teen life, when children set off on their own for the passage through adolescence.
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The 1920s are the decade that signaled the arrival of a gift that still means a lot to us: Saturday.
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Everybody should pay some tax, just as everybody should vote.
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Coolidge cut the budget, and even better, cut it during peace and prosperity. He left a federal budget lower than the one that greeted him when he arrived in office. He managed to freeze or cut the budget over more than five years in office. If you look at charts of presidents - Nixon, Ike, and Reagan - you see them failing on this score.
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Today many politicians suggest that where the federal government does not act, there must be anarchy. That view is odd, blinkering out the work of state and towns, which until recently did much of our charitable and cultural work. That view also blinkers out the role of mutual societies and churches.
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Coolidge really hated government being in the power business. He thought it was wrong. He saw the potential for growth in the power business. He didn't want the federal government in it.
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Economics are part of our life. We try to treat them separately, like over there is the economy and here is history. Econ affects history and history often doesn't get it right if it doesn't respect econ.
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The lucky biographers find themselves drawn into a sort of friendship with their subject.
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Coolidge was a federalist. You go back and read him and it's almost intimidating to write about him because he writes better himself than anyone. He's one of the best writers as presidents go.
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Disillusionment can come as fast as a gust, but building faith that the government won't inflate again is like building a new sailboat, a project of years.
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To investors, job creation is a second-order effect. Market participants care first about interest rates, exchange rates, bond prices and the one great factor that affects all three: the long-term solvency of a bond company called the U.S. government.
Amity Shlaes