America, love it or lump it

September 25 is American Indian Day.

"America is the only nation in history which miraculously has gone directly from barbarism to degeneration without the usual interval of civilization." -- Georges Clemenceau.

September 26: Poet T. S. Eliot was born Sept. 26, 1880. He wrote:

"Human kind cannot bear very much reality."




September 27: American Revolutionary War patriot Samuel Adams was born Sep. 27, 1722.

"The 100-percent American is 99 percent an idiot." -- George Bernard Shaw.

On September 28, 1841, Georges Clemenceau himself (see above) was born. He was a French statesman. Another French statesman, Charles DeGaulle, had this to say a century later, though not apropos of Clemenceau:

"Since a politician never believes what he says, he is surprised when others believe him."

A Cynics Primer: B-C-D

Catching up again:

July 22: Poet Stephen Vincent Benet was born July 22, 1898. He wrote:

We do not fight for the real but for the shadows we make;
A flag is a piece of cloth and a words is a sound.



July 23: American mystery writer Raymond Chandler (pictured above) was born July 23, 1880. He wrote:

"Television is just one more facet of that considerable segment of our society that never had any standard but the soft buck." And also:

"It is pretty obvious that the debasement of the human mind caused by a constant flow of fraudulent advertising is no trivial thing. There is more than one way to conquer a country."



For more on Chandler, visit Today in Farewells

July 24: Alexandre Dumas pere was born July 24, 1802.

"Nobody has read everything of Dumas, not even Dumas himself." -- Anonymous.

Cross your heart, and your fingers

The Pledge of Allegiance was sanctioned by Congress on this day in 1945.

"Nothing like a solemn oath. People always think you mean it." -- Norman Douglas.