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President Reagan is a rhetorical roundheels, as befits a politician seeking empathy with his audience.

William Safire

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William Safire
Age: 79 †
Born: 1929
Born: December 17
Died: 2009
Died: September 27
Author
Columnist
Journalist
Writer
New York City
New York
William Lewis Safire
Seeking
Politician
Audience
President
Befits
Rhetorical
Reagan
Empathy

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I'm a right-wing pundit and have been for many years.
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In lieu of those checks and balances central to our legal system, non-citizens face an executive that is now investigator, prosecutor, judge, jury and jailer or executioner. In an Orwellian twist, Bush's order calls this Soviet-style abomination 'a full and fair trial.'
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It behooves us to avoid archaisms. Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do.
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I could get a better education interviewing John Steinbeck than talking to an English professor about novels.
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The new, old, and constantly changing language of politics is a lexicon of conflict and drama?ridicule and reproach?pleading and persuasion.
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No one flower can ever symbolize this nation. America is a bouquet.
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When duty calls, that is when character counts.
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Never assume the obvious is true.
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[Senators John Kerry & John Edwards] have risen high in Democratic polls with a brand of class resentment and soak-the-rich rhetoric rooted in the old-fashioned liberalism of Ted Kennedy.
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By elevating your reading, you will improve your writing or at least tickle your thinking.
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The tension between the governed and the governing is what makes the world go 'round. It's not love, it's that tension, because that tension exists in love affairs. The whole idea of control is at the heart of human relationships. Control and resistance to control.
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English is a stretch language one size fits all.
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Writers who used to show off their erudition no longer sing in the bare ruined choir of the media.
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The CEO era gave rise to the CFO (not certified flying object, as you might imagine, but chief financial officer) and, most recently, the CIO, chief investment officer, a nice boost for the bookkeeper you can't afford to give a raise . . .
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The remarkable legion of the unremarked, whose individual opinions are not colorful or different enough to make news, but whose collective opinion, when crystallized, can make history.
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Create your own constituency of the infuriated.
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The first ladyship is the only federal office in which the holder can neither be fired nor impeached.
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At a certain point, what people mean when they use a word becomes its meaning.
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The perfect Christmas gift for a sportscaster, as all fans of sports clichés know, is a scoreless tie.
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George Washington had a tough second term.
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