Quote For The Week

And this one is a powerful one that I came upon and credit to Bill Maher for putting me up on game this past Friday on his weekly show 'Realtime With Bill Maher'. The panel were about taxes and the economy and the crisis that we're facing how we got in such a mess. The problem in all of this being the overarching wealth at the top and richest people in America vs. the poor and how wide that margin has become in recent times and how the George Bush tax cuts have helped coddled the inequality and how toxic that is becoming and bearing itself out in the turmoil we find ourselves. Maher then referenced Marriner S. Eccles, who served as Franklin D. Roosevelt's Chairman of the Federal Reserve from November 1934 to February 1948, detailed what he believed caused the Depression (one that many believe we're on the eve of right now):

"Instead of achieving that kind of distribution, a giant suction pump had by 1929-30 drawn into a few hands an increasing portion of currently produced wealth. This served them as capital accumulations. But by taking purchasing power out of the hands of mass consumers, the savers denied to themselves the kind of effective demand for their products that would justify a reinvestment of their capital accumulations in new plants. In consequence, as in a poker game where the chips were concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, the other fellows could stay in the game only by borrowing. When their credit ran out, the game stopped."


We really need to elect a person that understands this.

Top Fifity Charles Barkley Quotes

50. "I can be bought. If they paid me enough, I'd work for the Klan."

49. "You got to believe in yourself. Hell, I believe I'm the best-looking guy in the world and I might be right."

48. "I don't hate anyone, at least not for more than 48 minutes, barring overtime."

47. "We better not be doing the Bulls this year. Man, they suck! Bunch of high school kids with $70 million contracts. Damn! I hate my mother for having me too soon."

46. "You can talk without saying a thing. I don't ever want to be that type of person."

45. After retiring from basketball "I'm just what America needs - another unemployed black man.

44. Ernie: "Did they recognize you in South Dakota?"
Charles: "Yes, they did. It was easy because I was the only black person there. When they see me walking down the street they say 'There he goes again'. And when I come back the next year they say 'He's back yawl!'"

43. Right after Peja won the 3-point contest: "Kenny said it was going to be an all-international night. I want to know which international brother is going to win the slam dunk contest."

42. On the Enron scandal investigation: "Almost all those politicians took money from Enron, and there they are holding hearings. That's like O.J. Simpson getting in the Rae Carruth jury pool."

41. "I had to explain to my daughter why that skank Monica Lewinski has an hour special on HBO this weekend."

40. Ernie: "Auburn is a pretty good school. To graduate from there I suppose you really need to work hard and put forth maximum effort."
Charles: "20 pts and 10 rebounds will get you through also!"

39. "Every time I think about changing a diaper, I run a little bit harder and a little bit faster to make sure I can afford a nanny until my daughter's old enough to take care of that herself."

38. EJ: "Did you graduate from Auburn?"
Charles: "No, but I have a couple people working for me who did."

37. Bavetta and Moses parted the Red Sea together."

36. Ernie Johnson, on Reggie Evans being caught grabbing the nuts of Chris Kaman: "(Reggie Evans) got caught with his hand in the cookie jar."Charles Barkley: "Ernie, I don't know where you get your cookies at but the rest of us don't get ours there."

35. On his 17-year old daughter not dating yet: "Thank goodness. I just hope she doesn't start before I go in the Hall of Fame. That way, I won't have to kill anybody before I get inducted."

34. Kenny: "There's guys who go over to Europe and play overseas from America, and they dominate!"
Charles: "Those are called 'brothers'

33. After Wang has a shot blocked: "He's got to bring something stronger than that. That's like bringing milk to a bar, it's not strong enough"

32. Barkley on Turner Sports office having a betting pool on his weight: "That is starting to hurt my feelings. I don't mind skinny people making fun of me, we all do that, but I don't want fat people making fun of me."

31. "We are in the business of kicking butt and business is very, very good."

30. When the Dream Team was about to play the Angola national team, during pre-game interviews the other USA players provided diplomatic, face saving comments about how they would play hard and felt strongly they would win. When Chuck was asked about Angola and the game, he replied: "They're in a lot of trouble."

29. Charles Barkley on his thoughts about retiring before the season: "I remember sitting down with the Rockets and saying, 'Yeah. I'm going to retire.' They said, 'Well, we'll give you $9 million.' And I said, 'You got a pen on you?'"

28. Man, everything gets blamed on the Clintons, every single thing in this world. I think Bill Clinton shot JFK, too.

27. "I know why his name is DMX. Because his real name is Earl. Imagine if his name was Earl the rapper."

26. "If you go out with a girl and they say she has a great personality, she's ugly. If they tell you a guy works hard, he can't play a lick. Same thing."

25. After Kevin Garnett threw a ball into the crowd out of frustration and was ejected. They showed footage of the man that got hit by the ball being taken away in a stretcher and his daughter was crying. Charles commented that players take passes to the face all the time. He topped it off by saying: "You know why that little girl's crying? It's because she's thinking 'my daddy's a pussy'".

24. Barkley on Ernie Johnson and Kenny Smith eating a box of hot Krispy Kreme donuts in front of him: "Both of y'all are going to hell for that. Y'all are going to hell with a first-class ticket. Is that how you treat your partner? Krispy Kreme might be the greatest invention in the history of civilization when they're hot. Y'all are cruel man."

23. "It's kinda great to see the Celtics doing well again cuz that was so much fun in my day to go to the Boston Garden and they spit at you and throw things at you and talk about your mom. It sounds like dinner at Kenny Smith's house."

22. "I think that the team that wins game five will win the series. Unless we lose game five."

21. Charles Barkley after seeing a picture of Sam Cassell on the screen: "Phone home." And later he remarks to Kenny, "Sam Cassell is a good guy, but he's not going to wind up on the cover of GQ anytime soon."

20. While watching someone in Australia put $1 million worth of rubies on a table: "Damn, must not be any black folks in Australia. You can't just leave $1 million worth of jewelry lying around the 'hood."

19. Asked if he had ever been in the governor's office in Montgomery, Barkley said no. "They don't let many black people in the governor's mansion in Alabama," he said, "unless they're cleaning."

18. On the goal of the '92 Olympic Dream Team when playing Panama in the Tournament of the Americas: "To get the Canal back."

17. To Kenny: "Hakeem couldn't kick your ass cuz you were too close, kissin his!"

16. Barkley on Hanno Mottola, who, as EJ remarked "is the first NBA player from Finland". Charles replies: "Of course he is the first NBA player from Finland, he's the only person in Finland."

15. On supersized Oliver Miller: "You can't even jump high enough to touch the rim, unless they put a Big Mac on it."

14. "All I know is, as long as I led the Southeastern Conference in scoring, my grades would be fine."

13. On North Carolina missing 22 of its last 23 shots in losing to Georgetown in the NCAA tournament : "Stevie Wonder could make one of 23 shots."

12. I'd never buy my girl a watch... she's already got a clock over the stove.

11. "I always laugh when people ask me about rebounding techniques. I've got a technique. It's called just go get the damn ball."

10. On the Portland Trail Blazers (back when they were known as the Jail Blazers) serving Thanksgiving meals: "In between arrests they do community service."

9. "Yeah Ernie, its called defense, I mean I wouldn't know anything about it personally but I've heard about it through the grapevine.

8. "Well, when I went off to college, the guys I used to hang with were pumping gas and voting Democrat. Today they're still pumping gas and voting Democrat. Guess the Democrats didn't do much for them."

7. "When I was recruited at Auburn [university], they took me to a strip joint. When I saw those titties on Buffy, I knew that Auburn met my academic requirements."

6. "Hey Stanley, you could be a great player if you learned just two words: I'm full."-- Barkley yelling to 300-plus-pound Houston Rockets teammate Stanley Roberts

5. "I heard Tonya Harding is calling herself the Charles Barkley of figure skating. I was going to sue her for defamation of character, but then I realized I have no character."

4. On the All-Star Game: "Hell, there ain't but 15 black millionaires in the whole country & half of 'em are right here in this room."

3. On Jerry Krause still being able to keep his job as GM of the Chicago Bulls: "Jerry Krause must have pictures of his boss's wife having sex with a monkey."

2. After throwing a guy through a 1st floor window in a bar Charles was in front of the judge.
Judge: "Your sanctions are community service and a fine, do you have any regrets?"
Charles: "Yeah I regret we weren't on a higher floor"

1. After an Olympic Dream Team victory over Angola, in which they won 116-48, Charles got into a physical altercation with a member of Angola towards the end of the game, afterwards he says: "Somebody hits me, I'm going to hit him back. Even if it does look like he hasn't eaten in a couple weeks. I thought he was going to pull a spear on me."

And Now, Random Positivity Via Robert F. Kennedy

So anyway, people that know me in real life know I'm a big Robert F. Kennedy fan because he embodied everything that I find morally and politically noble and so from time to time I run across a quote from the man that I jot down and so I'll share a few memorable quotes that I find particularly profound among his many many great words as I've been fairly negative lately and I should mix some hope in here every once in a while.

"What has violence ever accomplished? What has it ever created? No martyr's cause has ever been stilled by an assassin's bullet. No wrongs have ever been righted by riots and civil disorders. A sniper is only a coward, not a hero; and an uncontrolled, uncontrollable mob is only the voice of madness, not the voice of reason. Whenever any American's life is taken by another American unnecessarily - whether it is done in the name of the law or in the defiance of the law, by one man or a gang, in cold blood or in passion, in an attack of violence or in response to violence - whenever we tear at the fabric of the life which another man has painfully and clumsily woven for himself and his children, the whole nation is degraded."

Right after his brother John F. Kennedy was taken from us.

"You knew that what is given or granted can be taken away, that what is begged can be refused; but that what is earned is kept."

"The problem of power is how to achieve its responsible use rather than its irresponsible and indulgent use -- of how to get men of power to live for the public rather than off the public."

"In this entire century the Democratic Party has never been invested with power on the basis of a program which promised to keep things as they were. We have won when we pledged to meet the new challenges of each succeeding year. We have triumphed not in spite of controversy, but because of it; not because we avoided problems, but because we faced them. We have won, not because we bent and diluted our principles, but because we stood fast to the ideals which represent the most noble and generous portion of the American spirit."

"If any man claims the Negro should be content... let him say he would willingly change the color of his skin and go to live in the Negro section of a large city. Then and only then has he a right to such a claim."

"....as long as there is plenty, poverty is evil."

Right on, Bobby.

A Prophetic Robert F. Kennedy Quote From 1968

He gave a speech to the Voice of America all around the world 40 years ago. And despite what was going on in the country, particularly in Alabama, Bobby Kennedy said this: Things are "moving so fast in race relations a Negro could be president in 40 years." This is in 1968, we're now in 2008. "`There's no question about it,' the attorney general said. `In the next 40 years a Negro can achieve the same position that my brother has.' ... Kennedy said that prejudice exists and probably will continue to ... `But we have tried to make progress and we are making progress. We are not going to accept the status quo.

- Robert F. Kennedy, Washington Post May 27, 1968
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R.I.P Bobby. You were hope before Obama.