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A reader should be able to identify a column without its byline or funny little picture on top purely by look or feel, or its turgidity ratio.

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
Able
Column
Look
Columns
Little
Purely
Without
Identify
Looks
Picture
Feel
Reader
Feels
Funny
Ratio
Littles
Ratios

More quotes by William Safire

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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.'
William Safire
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One difference between French appeasement and American appeasement is that France pays ransom in cash and gets its hostages back while the United States pays ransom in arms and gets additional hostages taken.
William Safire
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The Latin motto over Poindexter's new Pentagon office reads Scientia Est Potentia - knowledge is power. Exactly: the government's infinite knowledge about you is its power over you.
William Safire
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It behooves us to avoid archaisms. Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do.
William Safire
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The Republicans do not look on the Democrats as the evil empire.
William Safire
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I welcome new words, or old words used in new ways, provided the result is more precision, added color or greater expressiveness.
William Safire
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I'm willing to zap conservatives when they do things that are not libertarian.
William Safire
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Don't expect others to do your work for you.
William Safire
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The most fun in breaking a rule is in knowing what rule you're breaking.
William Safire
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A dependent clause is like a dependent child: incapable of standing on its own but able to cause a lot of trouble.
William Safire
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Adapt your style, if you wish, to admit the color of slang or freshness of neologism, but hang tough on clarity, precision, structure, grace.
William Safire
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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 . . .
William Safire
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By elevating your reading, you will improve your writing or at least tickle your thinking.
William Safire
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When your government, employer, landlord, merchant, banker and local sports team gang up to picture, digitize and permanently record your every activity, you are placed under unprecedented control.
William Safire
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A man who lies, thinking it is the truth, is an honest man, and a man who tells the truth, believing it to be a lie, is a liar.
William Safire
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As long as one American is hungry... then we have unfinished business in this country.
William Safire
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Last, but not least, avoid cliches like the plague.
William Safire
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Never assume the obvious is true.
William Safire
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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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You don't want lopsided government. You don't want one side running roughshod over the other.
William Safire