Archive

"Nothing would please me more, but who else would pump the oil that we need? God damn America." - Muammar Gaddafi, Response to a question on expelling Americans from Libya, March 1973

“Money, says the proverb, makes money. When you have a little, it is often easier to get more. The great difficulty is to get that little." - Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations, 1776

"Let them say what they say. The truth is, I did not engage in corruption." - Suharto, Indonesian dictator alleged to have embezzled up to (USD) $35 billion during his 31-year rule, October 2007

"I believed wrongly that there was integrity and a moral fibre in the top structure. But it seems that I was wrong," Eugene de Kock, former South African police colonel and assassin, 1 October 1997.

"Landlords grow rich in their sleep," - motivational poster quoting John Stuart Mill, seen in the window of Chase Wealth Australia, 25 January 2021

"If Yeltsin suspends an anti-democratic Parliament, it is not necessarily an anti-democratic act." - Anonymous Clinton Administration official quoted in the New York Times, 13 March 1993

"I like my history in high-definition, widescreen, full, vibrant colour." - Scott Morrison, Australian Prime Minister, first speech to parliament, 14 February 2008.

"There’s just not really that much you can tell without knowing who people voted for," - Nate Silver, statistician and editor of FiveThirtyEight, 4 November 2020.

In which I declare my sources for the series so far...

In which we take advantage of a loophole...