People From Philadelphia

"Now, when we go into a park on the road people start booing me. You don't know how good that makes me feel. To me it means the fans recognize who I am and what I mean to my ball club. Fans don't boo nobodies."

"I did very little against two lefties, Mike Caldwell and Scott McGregor, for a few years anyway. Eventually, I caught up with both of them, though. It was really Jim Palmer who stands out in this context; I had some success against him overall, but he was so good in clutch situations that I never really hurt him when the game was on the line."

"As he was going around [the bases], I was applauding into my glove. [...] I have never seen anything like that in a championship game situation. He beat us singlehandedly. And actually that's exactly what he did. He knocked in five runs and we only scored four. I sure wish I'd had a chance to talk to him at first base. But he didn't stay there long enough for conversation."

"Politics was a struggle for power, in its purest and simplest terms. If the voters were lucky, the winner would go on to improve their lot, because he would need their votes next time. Or because he enjoyed being popular. But issues were irrelevant. Always had been, probably. Once the age of mass communications arrived, presidents became entertainers, celebrities, if they were smart. FDR used his fireside chats; Kennedy had allowed spontaneous questions at press conferences, relying on wit and charm. Reagan knew from the films exactly how a president should behave, and he had exactly enough acting talent to bring it off. In that sense, he was the first modern president."

"Charlie was not a believer. He did not expect to be called to account and assigned a score for what he had done or left undone. His parents had believed in a mechanical world, a place of evolving hardware and software, no deities need apply. We just haven’t figured it all out yet, his father was fond of saying. Things get more complex and we don’t know why. But that doesn’t mean we have to ascribe it to divine providence."

"It is not faith per se that creates the problem; it is conviction, the notion that one cannot be wrong, that opposing views are necessarily invalid and may even be intolerable."

"There is no justice. There are occasional acts of vengeance, or regret, but there’s no real justice. In the natural scheme of things, it is not possible."

"For Rick, it was a clear demonstration of what the game was really about. The media often maintained that campaigns weren’t substantive. But the media didn’t understand about electioneering. When they complained that issues were seldom discussed, that the debate got too personal, that in the end a fog of obfuscation was thrown over everything, they were missing the point: An election is an art form. Its purpose is not to illuminate the issues of the day, but to box in an opponent. To watch him try to wriggle free of charges and innuendo."

"Starships, of course, have few limitations with regard to design, the prime specification being simply that they not disintegrate during acceleration or course change."

"Fiction is unlike reality because it has an end, a conclusion, which allows the characters to stroll happily, or perhaps simply more wisely, out through the climax into the epilogue. But life is a tapestry. It has no satisfactory end. There are simply periods of acceleration and delay, victory and frustration, seasoned with periodic jolts of reality."

"As a rule, Evelyn disapproved of politicians. They tended to break down into two categories: the completely unprincipled, who comprised the vast majority; and those who lived by their principles no matter who suffered."

"Like his father, he believed the universe a clockwork mechanism; and if there was a clockmaker, he’d hidden himself too well and had therefore no justifiable complaint with unbelievers."

"The creative act requires both will and intelligence. Breaking things is easy. You only need a hammer."

"He was a good salesman, which was to say he could look people directly in the eye while making the most preposterous claims."

"(He was) tall and lean, an aristocrat by inclination, born into money and influence and never recovered."

"MacAllister commented recently that Plato was right, that democracy is mob rule, that the voters can be counted on consistently to find the candidate with the fewest scruples and put him in office."

"It was housed in one of those garish ultramodern steel and glass abstract buildings, designed to demonstrate a kind of mathematical flow but which really only succeeded in marring the landscape."

"The idiots always rose to the top and made policy. It explained a lot of things."

"A man without money is a bow without an arrow."

"We know that when change comes, no one is more adamant in holding on to the past than those in power. They know change is inevitable, but they would, if they could, parcel it out in measured pieces. Grain for chickens."

"Truth is slippery, not because it is difficult to grasp, but because we prefer our preconceptions, our beliefs, our myths."

"Decisions are always made with insufficient information. If you really knew what was going on, the decision would make itself."

"But the old man had provided his kids with one priceless gift: He’d encouraged them to read, and he didn’t bother too much about the content, subscribing to the theory that good books ultimately speak for themselves."

"Cities have a social utility, if only as places to get away from."

"The Reverend Pullman sat on the opposite side of the bench, wearing clerical garb and one of those unctuous smiles that proclaims a monopoly on truth."

"“If some of the current politicians had been around a few thousand years ago,” she’d said, “we never would have gotten out of Africa. Boats cost too much.”"

"“Most of my business comes from picking up the pieces when people get things wrong.” She grinned. “I’ll never lack for work.”"

"The notion that we need a higher power, that’s more a human failing than a reflection of reality. The universe pays no attention to what we need. Truth is what it is, and the inconveniences it might cause us don’t change anything."

"New worlds are always hard on old ideas."

"Truth is like nudity: It is on occasion indispensable, but it is dangerous and should not be displayed openly. It is truth that gives life its grandeur, but the polite fictions that make it bearable."

"“I'm not optimistic,” he said. “The issue clearly flies in the face of the First Amendment. People have a right to tell kids whatever they want about religion.” “Do they have a right to push human sacrifice?” “Of course not, Mac. But this isn’t human sacrifice. It’s just a church school.” “I'm not sure the effect isn’t similar.”"

"The beginning of wisdom is to admit to being inept. We’re all a bit slow. We have our moments, but in the end, we have to resort to bumbling through. It is what makes conviction so egregious."

"When do we reach a point where people become responsible for their own actions?"

"An optimist is somebody who thinks our various political and social systems, schools and churches, support groups and Boy Scout troops, jury trials and congressional committees, are on the up-and-up. That they are intended for the benefit of the members. The reality is that they are designed to keep everyone in line."

"Max was the exception. He had no taste for military life or for the prospect of getting shot at. His father, Colonel Maxwell E. Collingwood, USAF (retired), to his credit, tried to hide his disappointment in his only son. But it was there nonetheless, and Max had, on more than one occasion, overheard him wondering aloud to Max’s mother whether there was anything at all to genetics."

"He expected to have only one clear shot at the assorted joys of living, and he had no intention of risking it to meet someone else’s misconceived expectations."

"The uplifters are forever running around telling blockheads they would do better if they would believe in themselves. But they already do. That is why they are blockheads."

"Plato is correct about democracy. It is essentially mob rule. And once the mob gets an idea into its collective head, it’s almost impossible to get it out, or modify it in any way. In an era of mass communication and irresponsible media, it can be a deadly characteristic."

"He was usually easygoing, one of those guys with little respect for authority because of a conviction that people in charge tend to do stupid things."

"Ev was a careful man, a model of caution. He took pride in not committing to a view until all the facts were in. Which meant, of course, that he was never quite on board. Or in opposition."

"See what the world looks like from orbit. Well, in that way, at least, there was profit to be had. Nobody could look down at the planet, green and blue, with no borders in evidence and no sign of human habitation, and not get his perspective forever altered."

"When things go wrong, the standard management strategy is to decide who takes the blame. This should be an underling, as far down the chain as possible, but preferably with some visibility so people know management means business."

"Sometimes the cost of integrity is the loss of a friend."

"The earliest religious feeling MacAllister could recall was being annoyed at Adam, because it was his fault that girls subsequently had to wear clothes."

"Freedom and idiots make a volatile mix. And the sad truth is that the idiocy quotient in the general population is alarmingly high."

"Idiots are not responsible for what they do. The real guilt falls on rational people who sit on their hands while the morons run wild. You can opt out if you want to. Play it safe. But if you do, don’t complain when the roof comes down."

"Most government and corporate leaders would have trouble getting people to follow them out of a burning building. One way you can tell the worst of them is that they talk about leadership a lot. I doubt Winston Churchill ever used the word. Or, for that matter, Attila the Hun."

"The reality is, we don’t want our kids to be smart. We want them to be like us. Only more so."

"If you're right, and nobody really cares what’s out there, I wonder whether we’re even worth saving."

"In the larger scale of things, his opinions didn’t count anyhow. The politicians made the decisions, and the voters paid no attention."