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I want my questions answered by an alert and experienced politician, prepared to be grilled and quoted -- not my hand held by an old smoothie.

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
Hands
Alert
Answered
Experienced
Held
Questions
Smoothie
Politician
Smoothies
Prepared
Grilled
Hand
Quoted

More quotes by William Safire

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To 'know your place' is a good idea in politics. That is not to say 'stay in your place' or 'hang on to your place', because ambition or boredom may dictate upward or downward mobility, but a sense of place - a feel for one's own position in the control room-is useful in gauging what you should try to do.
William Safire
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The perfect Christmas gift for a sportscaster, as all fans of sports clichés know, is a scoreless tie.
William Safire
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Why use a modifier to set straight a not-quite-right noun when the right noun is available?
William Safire
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This is what it's all about. From what I could see, you could get a bunch of people together, whip up the press and have some impact.
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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Create your own constituency of the infuriated.
William Safire
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Decide on some imperfect Somebody and you will win, because the truest truism in politics is: You can't beat Somebody with Nobody.
William Safire
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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.
William Safire
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To be accused of 'channeling' is to be dismissed as a ventriloquist's live dummy, derogated at not having a mind of one's own.
William Safire
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A book should have an intellectual shape and a heft that comes with dealing with a primary subject.
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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Sir Alec Douglas-Home, when he was British Foreign Secretary, said he received the following telegram from an irate citizen: To hell with you. Offensive letter follows.
William Safire
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Last, but not least, avoid cliches like the plague.
William Safire
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Do not be taken in by 'insiderisms.' Fledgling columnists, eager to impress readers with their grasp of journalistic jargon, are drawn to such arcane spellings as 'lede.' Where they lede, do not follow.
William Safire
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At a certain point, what people mean when they use a word becomes its meaning.
William Safire
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Avoid overuse of 'quotation “marks.”'
William Safire
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Carter is the best President the Soviet Union ever had.
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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Never look for the story in the 'lede.' Reporters are required to put what's happened up top, but the practiced pundit places a nugget of news, even a startling insight, halfway down the column, directed at the politiscenti. When pressed for time, the savvy reader starts there.
William Safire
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The first ladyship is the only federal office in which the holder can neither be fired nor impeached.
William Safire