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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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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
Exactly
Infinite
Office
Knowledge
Power
Pentagon
Government
Reads
Motto
Latin

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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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I'm a right-wing pundit and have been for many years.
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The most successful column is one that causes the reader to throw down the paper in a peak of fit.
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The wonderful thing about being a New York Times columnist is that it's like a Supreme Court appointment - they're stuck with you for a long time.
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At a certain point, what people mean when they use a word becomes its meaning.
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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.
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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.
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As long as one American is hungry... then we have unfinished business in this country.
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