Madeleine Albright on the United Nations

I got a chuckle from this quote from a Madeleine Albright speech that aired on KQED last night:

"There are a lot of people in the United States that will never like the UN. They are afraid that it has black helicopters that swoop down and steal our lawn furniture, and then there actually are people that will never like it because it's full of foreigners, which, frankly, can't be helped."

It was a profound, thoughtful speech, but delivered in early 2004. Now she is on the campaign trail, and like all the candidates and surrogates, in the hope of getting five seconds of airtime on the 6 o'clock news, has resorted to pithy soundbites like, "Some people ask me what I'm doing, and I say flat out that I'm trying to overthrow the government," and "George Bush said it's hard work? Well let's give him a break."

Speaking of soundbites, I'm going to puke the next time I hear Bush squeal "He can run, but he can't hide."

These made-for-TV soundbites remind me of every Schwarzenegger movie with five or six built in catch phrases which are less for the movie than for the clips about the movie. Terminator 3's desperate attempts never quite caught on. Remember "I'm back!" and "Speak to the hand"? Me neither.