Favorite Words That a Politician Lived to Regret?

[Derleth]

@Subway Prophet

Ya know, I didn’t think much of the guy (them Democrats vying for the White House are all politicians) but I never understood why this scream hurt him so badly. Was it because it was funny? Or because it was emotional? Or something else?

It made him sound like a crackmonkey on wheels. I don’t know why that’s worse than the average punter we elect. I guess we weren’t ready for someone who took “primal scream” therapy seriously to have his finger on the button.

Marion Barry, right?

Yep. DC’s one and only multi-term crackhead.

“Weather’s like rape – long as it’s inevitable, you might as well lie back and enjoy it.” - Clayton Williams, Texas candidate for governor.

“You don’t have many suspects who are innocent of a crime. That’s contradictory. If a person is innocent of a crime, then he is not a suspect.” - Ed Meese

I hate Ed Meeses to pieces.

[matt_mcl]

“I had no option.”

• John Turner, during the leader’s debate in the 1984 election, defending patronage appointments while being shellacked by Brian Mulroney. Mulroney came back with, “You had an option, sir!”, which cost the Liberals the election (along with various other gaffes) and has become proverbial for a knockout punch in a leaders’ debate.

“It’s true, it’s true that we have been defeated, but basically by what? By money and some ethnic votes, essentially.”

• Jacques Parizeau, premier of Quebec, in his speech following the “no” decision in the 1995 sovereignty referendum. It’s basically taken the sovereignty movement up until now to recover among cultural communities. (Honestly, from my recollection of the night, as soon as he came on stage, I thought he was drunk.)

[kung_fu_lola]

@matt_mcl

(Honestly, from my recollection of the night, as soon as he came on stage, I thought he was drunk.)

Doesn’t Jacques Parizeau pretty much equal drunk? Or am I just prejudiced against skeevy old French guys?
It can be both, right?

[JRDelirious]

@Derleth

It made him sound like a crackmonkey on wheels. I don’t know why that’s worse than the average punter we elect. I guess we weren’t ready for someone who took “primal scream” therapy seriously to have his finger on the button.

So instead we went for… well, we know who we went for.

Thing is, everybody on that dais was hootin’ and hollerin’, just so happens Dean actually yelled INTO the mic, which of course sounded like a crackmonkey on wheels.

[Acsenray]

@BrainGlutton

Of course she was wrong. When did teenagers ever need to be taught masturbation? Monkeys can work this shit out!

I think Elders was being serious. And I think she was more concerned about girls than boys. I seem to recall being told that there are a surprising number of adult women who have never tried masturbating or have never successfully masturbated to orgasm. Two contributing factors might be lack of accurate information about female sexuality and social taboos. Elders was trying to tackle both of these.

[Spoke]

I want to talk to you right now about a fundamental threat to American democracy… I do not refer to the outward strength of America, a nation that is at peace tonight everywhere in the world, with unmatched economic power and military might.

The threat is nearly invisible in ordinary ways. It is a crisis of confidence. It is a crisis that strikes at the very heart and soul and spirit of our national will. We can see this crisis in the growing doubt about the meaning of our own lives and in the loss of a unity of purpose for our nation.

–Jimmy Carter (so-called “malaise speech” July 15, 1979)

[Cardinal]

I’ve seen video of the “malaise speech”, and thought Carter did very well. I seem to recall from the documentary I was watching that it was well received, but that other events conspired to push Carter’s legacy into, well, not over the brink, but at least into the pool.