Dan Quayle has earned the modern distinction of making the Bartlett’s Book of Famous Quotations. “What a terrible thing to have lost one’s mind. Or not to have a mind at all,” he told the United Negro College Fund in 1989.
The campaign trail is littered with political bloopers and malapropisms. Al Gore’s latest makeover was overshadowed in Scranton, Pennsylvania, last week when he got a local legislator’s name wrong.
Boston Mayor Thomas Menino’s tongue twisters are renown around Boston. When he became acting mayor Menino announced he was embarking on a period of “transmission.” He told principals to install “mental” detectors in schools. And he called a shortage of parking spaces in the city an Alcatraz around his neck.
Napoleon Bonaparte once said, “In politics, absurdity is not a handicap.” And so it’s not.
(Hosted by Christopher Lydon)
Guests:
Author Richard Lederer