Quotes of the day

“Former presidents Bill Clinton and George H.W. Bush will serve as honorary chairmen of a new center at the University of Arizona that will focus on civility in political debate, university officials will announce Monday…

“Former Supreme Court justice Sandra Day O’Connor and former Senate majority leader Thomas A. Daschle (D-S.D.) will serve as honorary co-chairmen. Board members will include former secretary of state Madeleine K. Albright; Kenneth M. Duberstein, chief of staff to President Ronald Reagan; Fox News anchor Greta Van Susteren; Trey Grayson, director of Harvard University’s Institute of Politics; and former representative Jim Kolbe (R-Ariz.)…

“Clinton said in a statement that the new institute ‘can elevate the tone of dialogue in our country.'”

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“Despite their differences in beliefs Huckabee’s new book makes it clear from the very first page that it is not a book about hating Obama. The Republican takes on his fellow GOP members for accusing Obama of being a Marxist or a Muslim – and I asked Huckabee why Speaker Boehner or Rep. Bachmann would not clearly state that Obama is a Christian and citizen of the United States?

“‘You know, I don’t know why it’s hard,’ Huckabee said.

“‘I just don’t think it’s completely necessary for us to delve into such extraneous matters. And I’ll tell you, the idea that he’s not a citizen – you know why that’s nonsense? Because if there was a shred of truth to it, Hillary Clinton and her wonderful investigative opposition research team would have found it and would have used it,’ he told me. ‘And for Republicans to even be bringing it up, I think it’s a waste of energy and time. Let’s focus on the issues with which we have disagreement, not on really the extraneous personal things that are immaterial.'”

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“Last Tuesday, hundreds of protesters shut down the road in front of Gov. Walker’s family home in Wauwatosa, Wis. Across the state in Madison, a crowd of 20,000—many of them teachers skipping school—gathered at the Capitol. Signs compared Mr. Walker to Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak, Joseph Stalin and Benito Mussolini. Still others accused him of ‘terrorism’ and ‘rape.’ One sign had a photo of the governor in crosshairs: ‘Don’t Retreat, Reload.’

“Elected officials joined the protests—and the slurs. In a television interview on the sidelines of the demonstration, state Sen. Lena Taylor compared Mr. Walker to Adolf Hitler…

“In an interview with a Milwaukee television station last week the president acknowledged that he hadn’t followed the legislation in Wisconsin closely, but he characterized it as sounding like ‘an assault on unions.’ He made no mention of teachers violating the law in a de facto strike. He didn’t say a word about the incendiary rhetoric or the tactic of marching on lawmakers’ homes. And he said nothing about the missing state legislators and their antidemocratic walkout.

“In Tucson, the president called on Americans to honor the victims with a ‘more civil and honest public discourse’ that would ‘help us face up to the challenges of our nation in a way that would make them proud.’ Perhaps it’s unfair to expect him to answer for the offensive language and actions of Wisconsin’s protesters, though Joe Kiriaki is an Obama donor and Lena Taylor was an Obama superdelegate to the Democratic National Convention. But given his words just a month ago, is it too much to ask him to emphasize now that he meant what he said?”

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