Wednesday, May 9, 2007

Kennedy. Theodore C. Sorenson. Significant Sentences. Continued.

Significant sentences from Kennedy by Theodore Sorenson, a history of the words and philosophy of President Kennedy. Continued.

"...both he and the press were sometimes surprised, upon reading the transcript of a particularly successful extemporaneous tale, to find that the passages that sounded so memorable in his impassioned delivery were less impressive in cold print." p. 200.

JFK: "Do you realize...the responsibility I carry...I am the only person between Nixon and the White House." p. 203.

"In Rochester he quoted an earlier Republican candidate as having referred to it as Syracuse--proof, he said, that Republicans never did know where they were or where they were going." p. 207.

"It is a contest between the comfortable and concerned." p. 207.

JFK: "Last Thursday night, Mr. Nixon dismissed me as 'another Truman'...a great compliment and I have no hesitation in returning the compliment: I consider him 'another Dewey.' " p. 209.

JFK: "...not what kind of church I believe in, for that should be important only to me, but what kind of America I believe in." p. 215.

JFK: "...in the last seven days...he [Nixon] has called me an ignoramus, a liar, a pied piper... I just confine myself to calling him a Republican...and he says that is really getting low." p. 234.

"He [JFK] asked me to read all the past Inaugural Addresses (which I discovered to be a largely undistinguished lot, with some of the best eloquence, emanating from some of our worst Presidents)...." p. 270.

"He [JFK] asked me to study the secret of Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. My conclusion, which his inaugural applied, was that Lincoln never used a two-or three-syllable word where a one-syllable word would do, and never used two or three words where one would do." p. 270.

"He [JFK] wanted his Inaugural Address to be the shortest in the twentieth century...." p. 272.

"...those who foolishly sought power by riding the back of the tiger ended up inside." p. 276.

"...an age where the instruments of war have far outpaced the instruments of peace." p. 276.

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