* “We have men who have divorced themselves from life and love death more than you love life, and killing is one of their wishes.”–Al-Qaida in Mesopotamia spokesman Abu Mohammed.
* “I make no apologies for being reasonable.”–President Barack Obama, in responding to Iowa voters asking him about the compromises he has made.
* “The U.S. economy is highly resilient. We believe that the U.S. economy will achieve even better development as it rises to challenges.”–Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping at a Beijing meeting with Vice President Joe Biden.
* “You’re safe. Please understand that no one cares more about this (debt downgrade and China’s $1.17 trillion in U.S. Treasury securities) than we do, since Americans own 87 percent of all our Treasury bonds, while China owns 1 percent of our financial assets and 8 percent of our Treasury bills, respectively.” —Vice President Joe Biden to an audience at Sichuan University.
* “Flexible, diversified and wealthy economy.”–Fitch Ratings’ rationale for maintaining its AAA rating of U.S. debt.
* “It really isn’t that hard to turn the economy around. All you have to do is prioritize spending.”–Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann.
* “A former Jimmy Carter Democrat, Bachmann is an unwavering social conservative whose faceoff with Obama would energize black voters, whose support for the president has waned. … Black rage over Bachmann’s assertion in January that the Founding Fathers ended slavery– which they didn’t–would help get disillusioned blacks back into the Obama fold and to the polls on election day. So, too, would another Bachmann faux pas. In a mindless attempt to win over right-wingers in Iowa, Bachmann signed a ‘marriage vow’ document that suggested black children were better off when they were born into slavery ‘and raised by a mother and father in a two-parent household’ than are black children who were born after Obama took office.”–DeWayne Wickham, USA Today.
* “…Obama is enjoying an August political mini-comeback–simply by reaping the indirect benefits of Perry’s candidacy. The Texan’s entry makes it more likely that the Republican nomination battle will go longer, get uglier and force Romney further to the right.”–Mark Halperin, Time magazine.
* “The conventional wisdom in Washington is that nothing will pass because Republicans are committed above all else to depriving the president of any victories. … But polls that show tea party Republicans are currently less popular than atheists or Muslims could change their political calculation. Swaggering Republican honchos may find that they need to be seen as getting a few things done, even if it means the president gets a little credit, too.”–Jonathan
Alter, Bloomberg News.
* “Is multiculturalism a success here? Or does the sudden eruption of flash mobs suggest that the curtain has begun to be pulled back on diversity’s dark side here in America?”–Pat Buchanan, Creators Syndicate.
* “He’s the patriarch. If you want to do anything in Republican politics in this state, you almost have to go see Jeb Bush.”–State Sen. John Thrasher.
* “Ultimately I don’t want to do anything that will end up in any racial profiling or anything unfair to legal immigrants.”–Gov. Rick Scott on tougher Florida immigration laws.
* “When it comes to the UN, we need to make serious amendments to the treaty, or we need to get out of the UN. We do not need the UN, or any other countries, trying to tell us how to run this place.”–Republican Senate candidate Mike McCalister.
* “I’ll sign the pledge that says I won’t be signing pledges.”–Hillsborough County Commissioner Mark Sharpe, who has announced his candidacy for the 11th
Congressional District seat of Rep. Kathy Castor.
* “Is it an amenity? Sure. We cannot let the streetcar fail.”–Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn.